No Rest For The Damned
by K. Netz
Summary: A story of what happens to the original four of Left 4 Dead after Blood Harvest, and their rescue and meeting up with the four new survivors of Left 4 Dead 2 after The Parish. It's a journey of all eight as they band together through the apocalypse.
1. Son, We Just Crossed the Street

"A few months ago, I would have found myself sitting in my dorm room, my peppy roommate hanging with the captain of the college football team on her bed in the corner, and me sitting in a crappy bean bag chair watching zombie horror movies in between writing papers on my laptop. Just college, video games, and my sanity were all I had going for me. I never expected my life to take a totally different turn toward a newer adventure.

But you know how this movie ends…"

The faint sounds of clanking metal and voices filled the faded sights as memories twisted and blurred into the darkness. A familiar tone and feel slowly crept its way into the mind and wrapped itself around the blackness, making the memory its own.

"Get up!" A familiar tough, yet faint sarcastic voice commanded.

"Zoey, come on! Get up!" Francis said as he nudged the girl curled up in the corner of a damaged, but heavily barricaded small safe room. The pale concrete was dirty and crumbled and chipped in certain spots, leaving rubble and dust in patches on the floor. Remnants of blankets and boxes of food lay scattered about, indicating that someone at one point had lived there. One door into the room had a worn concrete slab and a rusty gas stove placed against it. The other door barricaded by a single metal pipe, showing the way to go.

Her eyes slowly opened as she regained her thoughts and remembered what was really going on.

"Come on, girl." Said Louis as he approached. "We've got to get moving. I hear the military's still holding out further south. We can make it, I know we can!"

"Yeah," Francis replied. "Just like the way the goddamn military was supposed to come get us the last five states we've been to."

"It's three states, Francis." Bill corrected. "We've been through five, but the military managed to take us across a couple of them."

"Yeah, whatever." Francis said sarcastically. "Let's just do it."

"Who knows Francis," Louis piped up. "Maybe they have a base off the coast of Florida, right on the beach line. Nice, warm sand to lie back in and relax, can't get any better than that."

"I hate sand."

"I'm not one for sun either." Zoey said, "I burn easy."

"Well quit yer yapping, 'cause we're leaving." Bill said. He reached next to him and lifted up his assault rifle. "This ain't going to be easy."

"Never is." Zoey replied softly as slowly stood up. She held tightly onto two pistols and aimed for the safe room door. "Well, ready when you are."

"Stay positive, guys. I've got a real good feeling about this one."

"All right," Francis said as he cocked his shotgun. "Let's do it."

Bill nodded as he carefully reached forward and slowly pushed the safe room door open.

As the morning light slowly lit up the horizon, the silhouette of a town on its edge made itself visible to the survivors.

The four stepped out of the safe room and stood surveying the horrid world in front of them.

"If I'm right," Louis said. "After passing the state line a few miles back, we should be reaching Savannah, Georgia just up ahead."

"Finally," Zoey replied. "We've been traveling for way too long."

"A few months in the trenches won't kill ya." Bill said as he took a puff of his cigarette. "The foxholes in 'Nam weren't enough to kill."

"Yeah, you just end up going crazy like Grandpa Bill here." Francis said.

"Watch out!" Zoey shouted as she shot at a large zombie with a meaty, mutated right arm run straight for them. His enlarged hand extended in front of him, anxious to grab the first human he could.

"Step aside, he's charging right for us!" Bill shouted as he quickly stepped out of the way.

Louis reached his arm outward and led Zoey by the shoulder away from the path of the zombie.

Francis smirked. "Oh yeah?" He said as he raised his shotgun and aimed toward the charging figure. "Come on, meatbag! Show me what you've got!"

As the Charger lunged its meaty claw toward Francis, he fired off a single shot to the zombie's head, causing it to flinch briefly, but increasing its rage. It swiped at Francis, knocking his gun out of his hand. In anger, Francis took a swing at the Charger, landing a solid hit to its face. The Charger roared in rage, and as it raised its right hand to latch onto Francis, Bill stepped in front of Francis, firing a barrage of bullets into the zombie's head. I one swift movement, the Charger fell backwards and collapsed onto the ground.

Francis reached down and picked up his shotgun. He walked casually up to the body of the Charger with his gun pointed at it. When he saw that there was no movement, he lowered his gun to stare at it in disgust.

"What the hell is it?" Francis spat. "A half-a-Tank or something?" He kicked at the Charger's body, the force causing its head to roll over.

"Whatever it was," Zoey said. "It's not like what anything we've seen."

"I think things got a little worse down south." Louis said.

"Great." Bill said. "The threat's always worse the deeper you get into it."

"We better keep moving." Zoey said as she looked around at the lingering zombies. "We don't want to find a zombie that attracts the horde."

"Right. Let's keep moving, guys!" Louis said.

The four managed to successfully arrive at Savannah, Georgia. The whole city was overrun and covered with zombies. As they cleared a path in the infected and made their way into the center of the city, signs were posted all over boarded up and barricaded buildings.

"Hey, look at this." Louis said as he approached one of the flyers posted on a boarded up window. "They say there's an evac station used by CEDA at the top of this very hotel!"

"Maybe they're still operating from it." Bill said.

As the four survivors began to climb the stairs to the higher floors, there was a sudden tremor felt through the building.

"Uh, guys." Zoey said. "What was that?"

Bill paused and removed his cigarette and sniffed the air.

"…Burning sulfur… and drywall."

He quickly turned to face the survivors.

"Back down people, the place is going up in flames!"

Suddenly, the roof above them began to crumble down in chunks as the nearby doors started to show visible burn marks along the bottom.

"All right people, let's move!" Francis shouted as he followed the other three. "We don't got all freakin' day!"

As the four stumbled out of the building, they looked up to see most of the hotel had been consumed in flames while they were inside.

"That was close!" Zoey said, out of breath.

"Maybe there were others like us." Louis said as he tried to catch a breath. "Other survivors somewhere."

"If there were," Bill said, still staring upward at the building. "They're either dead or long gone."

"Maybe for the better." Zoey said.

"Well, let's keep moving." Bill said solemnly.

As they trudged through the city, they each observed different remnants of the people who had come before them.

"Hey guys, look!" Louis said. "Here's a list of military bases still in tact in the Southern US. Looks like some of them are still running in Louisiana."

"Well if we can get to there," Bill said as he lit another cigarette. "Then maybe we'll finally leave all this behind."

Zoey read the graffiti along the walls of abandoned buildings. Some were for loved ones; others were warnings of the military outposts being overrun. One in particular made Zoey smile faintly.

"Ellis,

If you're reading this these bastards are all over, ya'll get the hell out!

-Keith"

Zoey shook her head and continued to follow the group.

Evening had fallen upon the four survivors as they finally reached the edge of the city, a freeway was their only lead as it shot straight toward the west, crowded with wrecked and abandoned cars. The four were forced to walk through the mess to guide themselves toward the next possible place to find a place to rest, and to find the military; their last and only hope.


	2. I Have Not, Come This Far, To Die Now

Night had fallen and covered the dark corners of the horizon before the survivors as they went by the dim light of their flashlights through the wreckage. As they illuminated the nearby cars, the few but hungry zombies made their way toward the survivors, who were quick to shoot them down. Their quick and precise movements seemed to be improved with constant practice.

As they came to another block of abandoned cars, a highly decorated blue sports car sat at the front of it.

Zoey approached the unusual vehicle and read the name painted across the door.

"Heh," she said. "Jimmy Gibbs, Jr." She read. She smirked, "Who the hell is that guy?"

"Wow, a real racecar!" Louis piped up. "Maybe this guy was a legend out here."

"He looks like a total fruitcake to me." Francis chuckled. "Who the hell wears a tight sparkly white jumpsuit around town?"

"Who the hell wears a crappy sleeveless vest all the time?" Bill shot back.

"Hey man, I don't hate vests." Francis said proudly. "But I hate people who try to tell me they hate them."

"Why, what do you do?" Zoey asked.

"I beat 'em to death." Francis said.

As they continued to weave through cars, the sights of broken glass and blood littered the ground and the sides of the cars. A few dead bodies were found still in their cars, or partially dragged through a window.

Bill continued to lead the group until he froze, hearing a familiar sound.

"Hold up." He paused. "Sounds like a witch."

"Oh, come on…" Zoey said. "After all we've had come at us…"

"Don't worry, we'll make it." Louis said.

Francis began to search around the nearby cars when he spotted something that lifted his spirits.

"Hey, a motorcycle!" He said enthusiastically.

He walked up to a motorcycle that was pinned between a station wagon and a large off-white van. He grabbed a hold of the handlebars and on the seat, and began to slowly jiggle the motorcycle free of its hold. As he managed to get the front end loose, he wheeled the motorcycle away from the cars, but got the back wheel stuck on a sharp metal bumper edge of the van.

"God dammit!" Francis grumbled. "I hate vans!"

With his anger increasing, he gave the motorcycle a quick yank and freed it from its entrapment.

He mounted the motorcycle and revved the engine.

"Hey, it still freakin' works!" He said. "Dude must've died before he could use it." He laughed.

"Is there any gas in it?" Louis asked.

"Hell yeah!" Francis replied. "Enough to take us past this waste dump." He turned to face the others. "Hey Zoey, wanna ride bitch with the road warrior?"

Zoey chuckled as she rolled her eyes.

"I guess, as long as we can find a way to bring back help."

"Don't worry about me," Bill said. "I can survive out here for as long as it takes."

"We'll find shelter." Louis said. "You go on ahead, and send help as fast as you can!"

"All right, get on." Francis said.

"I'll remember where you are. I'll come back with help, I swear!" She said as she got on the motorcycle behind Francis.

As the two prepared to weave through the wrecked cars and to the next city, Bill and Louis watched as they disappeared behind the ruins and prayed for safety, on both sides.

As dawn hit, a ruined and partially destroyed bridge lay in silence. On one corner, a small silhouette emerges and walks slowly to the edge. Soon, others join the figure, staring at the ruin before them. Nearby, portable radio makes incoherent noises echoing in the dust. A faint voice is heard interrupting the sound.

"…Hello?"

There is a pause in the noise, suddenly followed by a voice.

"…That's coming from the bridge!"

Standing before the body of a military officer, four other survivors tried to signal the military for help.

"Bridge," the voice spoke to them. "Identify yourselves."

"There's four of us up here." Rochelle spoke into the radio.

"I'm Ellis," Ellis said.

"There's four of us on…" Nick paused briefly to survey the area. "…On the west side of the bridge."

"Bridge, are you immune?" the voice asked.

"We are NOT infected." Nick commanded.

"Negative. Bridge, are you IMMUNE? Have you encountered the infected?"

"Well yeah, we've fought zombies." Ellis piped up.

"Encountered? Boy, I am covered in zombie blood and puke and eyeballs and twenty other parts I don't even recognize!" Coach bellowed. "WE ARE IMMUNE AS SHIT!"

"All right, prepare to cross the bridge, we will have an escort waiting for you on the other side."

"All right, let's get across the goddamn bridge!" Nick shouted as the military lowered the barricade. The loud screeching noise made by its joints rang out, attracting the remainder of the zombies on the bridge to come forth.

"All right, let's go, go, go!" Ellis shouted as he pulled out a machete.

The four began to make their way across the bridge, shooting and cutting apart zombies that got in their way.

Rochelle managed to climb atop a series of trucks, and shot the zombies below with a Magnum pistol.

Below, Coach held tightly onto an AK-47 as Ellis hacked away zombies with his machete and Nick used a chainsaw.

"YEAAHHH! DIIIIEEEE!" Nick shouted as he cut through a horde of zombies.

"Oh shit, watch out!" Coach said as he aimed for a Spitter anxiously waiting for Nick and Ellis to cross her patch.

As they continued to fight their way across the bridge, Rochelle spotted an unwelcome, but all too familiar sight.

"Uh, guys… we've got a Tank!"

"God DAMMIT!" Nick shouted as he dropped the chainsaw and reached backward for the shotgun mounted on his back.

"Watch it! TANK!" Ellis shouted as he ran from a flying car. The Tank roared as it kicked aside the nearby cars, throwing them at the survivors and flailing its arms in extreme rage.

Nick stepped forward and shot directly into the Tank's face, causing it to recoil briefly, but enough time for Nick, Coach and Rochelle to get in a few extra shots while Ellis sliced apart the other zombies as they tried to attack the other three.

"Is he dead?" Ellis shouted.

Just then the Tank roared loudly right behind Ellis. Suddenly one more loud gunshot was heard, followed by silence.

"He's dead." Nick said.

"Let's move!" Coach shouted.

"There's the end of the bridge!" Rochelle shouted as she pointed to the right. "We made it!"

"Come on, let's get the fuck out of here!" Nick commanded.

The four ran as quickly as they could, dodging more zombies and moving past fenced barricades.

Suddenly an animal-like shriek was heard from behind them as a Hunter leapt straight for Rochelle, pinning her and tearing her apart.

She screamed in pain as blood spattered everywhere.

"Ro!" Ellis shouted as he ran up to the Hunter, firing off countless shots with his shotgun.

"Come on, we gotcha." Coach said as he carefully lifted her up.

"They hurt you bad, but you ain't done yet. You're gonna need some first aid, 'cause you go down again and that's it."

Shaking with fear, Rochelle slowly nodded.

"Come on, come on!" Nick shouted. "None of us are gonna make it if we don't start heading for the goddamn chopper!"

"Just go…" Rochelle coughed. "I'll be fine. Just… go."

"No." Coach commanded. "We ain't leavin' you."

He held tightly onto Rochelle's shoulders and led her to the chopper. From inside the chopper, Nick and Ellis shot the zombies that were coming up from behind the other two.

Coach made it to the chopper and handed off Rochelle to the other two. He then quickly climbed in behind them and they all held on tight as the chopper flew away, leaving the pain, struggling, and deepest form of hell behind them.

As the chopper flew East, Nick sat behind the pilot toward the outside, staring downward at the view below. Ellis sat next to him, still tightly holding onto his shotgun as he looked over Nick's shoulder at the horizon. On the other side, Coach kept his hand pressed on Rochelle's stomach, trying to keep the wound from bleeding out any further. Rochelle just stared upward, breathing quickly and trying to ignore the searing pain.

Nick stared at the ground, still going over the horrid sights in his mind again and again. Things he never thought he would be bothered by, now forever engraved into his memory. The only thing that shook his concentration was the sight of a small fire below, with two people standing in front of it.

"Hey," He said as he looked at the pilot. "Hey! We've got survivors down there!"

The pilot looked at Nick, and then out the window to his left.

Rochelle quickly looked at Nick and leaned over Ellis to look down at the people on the ground.

She looked back at the pilot, his course unchanged.

"You can't just leave them down there!" She shouted at him. "You have to save them."

"Negative. There is not enough room in the chopper to hold any more people."

"Bullshit!" Nick shouted. "Turn this chopper around!"

"Negative."

"We have enough room for a few more people." Rochelle said sternly.

Nick got up and walked toward the cockpit. From the holster attached to his leg, he pulled out a Magnum and held it to the pilot's head.

"You're gonna turn this chopper around right now."

"Nick, you don't have to be violent about it." Rochelle said.

"Come on, man." Ellis said. "You don't need that. The pilot's gonna take us around anyway."

"Of course he is." Nick said, pressing the tip of the gun to the pilot's right temple. "Now this lovely lady here asked you to turn around. See, she's not doing so well over here and this may be her last request, you got me?"

The pilot nodded.

"All right then." Nick said as he put his pistol back into the holster. He turned to face the others. "He said he's going to do it."

"Good." Coach said. "Let's bring her down!"

Nick sat back in his seat as the chopper circled around and landed in front of the fire signal by the two other survivors.

Standing in front of a burning motorcycle stood Francis and Zoey, exhausted, out of ammo, and struggling to signal the nearest rescue.

When the chopper touched down, the two walked up toward the open chopper, where Nick had his hand extended outward.

Zoey stumbled toward the chopper as Nick reached his hand out.

"Give me your hand!" He shouted over the whirling of the chopper blades.

Zoey took his hand and was led into the chopper as Nick sat her down between him and Ellis. Francis grabbed onto the side of the chopper and climbed into the chopper and sat across from Coach and Rochelle.

"There's two more!" Zoey shouted to the pilot.

"Where are they?" Nick asked. He looked back toward the burning motorcycle. "I don't see them."

"They're back East, we left them just as the dawn hit us. We told them we'd be back with help."

"Let's go get 'em!" Ellis shouted.

"Negative. The base is closer than where your friends are. We can land in the base and then send a search party in the area."

"No! They've been fighting alone all night and morning, we can't leave them any longer."

"The young'un's right," Coach said. "If they're still alive, then we gotta bring them back with us. They'll fit in the chopper, even if I have to hang on to the bottom of this thing."

"Won't that be hard to counterbalance." Nick said.

"Turn back around." Zoey said, her hand slowly wrapping around her pistol. "Please…"

The pilot reluctantly nodded and continued to head East.

Leaning against an abandoned van, Bill and Louis stood next to each other, clutching tightly onto their assault rifles. As the horde began to grow in numbers, the two kept shooting with all their might, exhausting every bit of energy they could muster.

Above, the chopper pilot abandoned his descent and began to circle the area.

"What are you doing? You've got to land!"

"There's no place for me to land without risking all of our lives."

"Then I guess it's time to clear a way for our new friends here." Coach said as he lifted up his assault rifle.

"Kill all sons of bitches!" Ellis said as he held up his shotgun. "WOO!" He shouted as he got onto the floor of the chopper and stuck his gun out of the open door and began to shoot.

Coach stood above Ellis while Nick shot from his seat. Managing to keep herself intact, Rochelle shot her pistol downward by Nick. Zoey held onto the chopper and stuck out the open door, shooting her pistol. Behind her, Francis stood in the chopper, shooting his shotgun into the horde.

On the ground, Louis watched as the zombies in front of him slowly fell and died. Next to him, Bill stood stiff, using reserve energy and tactics he learned during his time in the service. He saw the chopper and pulled out a pipe bomb and threw it into the crowd of zombies. As they all ran toward it, Bill pointed toward the chopper.

"Let's get the hell out of here!" He shouted.

The two ran as fast as their drained bodies could go. Behind them, the pipe bomb blew up the closest group of zombies, but the remaining ones began to scatter and run toward the chopper.

"Come on, let's go let's go!" Ellis shouted to the two. He stood up and gave Bill and Louis room to climb into the chopper.

As Nick and Zoey hung toward the outside of the chopper firing their pistols, with Ellis and Francis shooting off their shotguns next to them, they managed to rescue Bill and Louis, and keep all the zombies from invading the chopper. With all eight crammed into the chopper, they were at ease, awaiting their final return to safety.


	3. Stay Together To Survive

Soldiers lined the path from the helicopter landing pad leading to the military base. With their firearms by their side, they stood still as the pilot and a greeting officer led the survivors onto the base.

They were brought into a room that was empty, except for some tattered army posters and reports of the bases that were overrun by the infected. Dirt coated the floor and the white painted walls lined the small room.

"Wait here." One officer told the survivors.

The officer closed the door leading into the room, and walked out the other door, closing it behind him.

Trapped inside a quiet room, the survivors leaned against the walls, four on one side, four on the other, facing each other. A long, drawn out silence seemed to linger between them.

Bill stood almost at attention, staring at the floor. Coach noticed his behavior and began to study his manner.

Rochelle was given a quick bandage on her stomach, which seemed to help tremendously, for she was in little pain and could move a bit better than before. She looked curiously at Louis, who kept his composure, but seemed to have a faint smile on his face.

Ellis stared at Zoey, curious of who she was, remembering how she had acted back on the chopper and through all that they had faced.

Nick wasn't looking at anybody, until while studying the others, noticed a tattoo on Francis' right arm. He cocked his head to the side as he studied a familiar design. Francis spotted Nick's odd look, and gave him a glare.

"You got a problem, buddy?" Francis said sternly.

Nick looked at Francis as he glared at him with a look of anger. Nick glared back.

"No..." He said calmly as he lightly shook his head. "Not at all."

Once again the room was silent, aside from someone clearing their throat on occasion.

Finally, Ellis decided it was time to come forward.

"Well, I know we're all shy so I figured I'd be the first to introduce myself." He smiled. "My name's Ellis."

Louis looked at Ellis and smiled. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Ellis."

Ellis smiled at him.

Louis stepped forward and extended his hand. "I'm Louis."

"Nice meetin' ya, Louis." Ellis said as he shook his hand.

Just then Coach stepped forward. "Everyone calls me Coach."

"Nice to meet you, Coach." Louis said as he shook Coach's hand.

"Hi. I'm Rochelle." Rochelle said as she walked up to Louis.

"Glad to meet you too, Rochelle. How's the bandage?"

"It's fine." She smiled at Louis. "It's going to take a little while to heal they said, but I'm sure I'll be okay."

"Well that's good to hear." Louis replied.

She smiled at him. "Thank you."

"I'm Nick." Nick said, still leaning against the wall, staring at Louis.

Louis looked at Nick, puzzled. He nodded at Nick. "Nice to meet you."

Nick paused for a moment, looking at the other three and then back at Louis. Reluctantly, he stood up finally and walked up to Louis.

"Good to meet you, Louis." He said as he shook Louis' hand.

Nick turned to look at Francis.

"And you are…"

"I'm Francis." He said as he approached Nick.

"Francis, right…" He said.

"And you sir," Coach said to Bill. "What do they call you?"

Bill looked at Coach. "I'm Bill. Glad to meet all of you."

Ellis and Rochelle nodded.

Nick looked at the other three on the other side and noticed Zoey.

"Well I guess that leaves me." Zoey said as she stepped forward. "I'm Zoey."

Nick nodded. "Hi Zoey."

Zoey nodded to the group. "Hi…everyone." She looked back at Nick. "What, no handshake?"

He gave her a surprised, yet puzzled look. "You want one?"

"Oh no, I just wanted to see if you'd offer."

Nick paused, a little surprised. "Well you've got a little extra fire in you."

"Well you've got a little extra creepy in you." She shot back.

Ellis started laughing.

Nick turned around to look at Ellis' random outburst.

"I'm sorry Nick," He said, still laughing. "But she got you good."

He turned to face Zoey. "Yes she did. Well, for now."

"Good luck with that comeback." Zoey replied.

"We almost didn't make it if Nick didn't put a gun to that pilot." Ellis said.

"You did what?" Bill asked.

"He was gonna kill that pilot? What for?" Francis asked.

"He wasn't gonna turn around. I saw you guys, and I wasn't gonna just leave you down there."

"Yeah, and I had to threaten him the same way to make him go back even for you and Louis." Zoey said to Bill.

"Heh, I actually thought you were going to shoot the pilot…again." Francis chuckled.

"Hey, Nick shot the pilot on us, too!" Ellis said.

"He was A ZOMBIE!" Nick and Zoey both shouted.

The two turned to look at each other in surprise.

"You BOTH shot chopper pilots?" Ellis said in amazement.

At that moment, the door opened and out walked the same officer that led them in.

"We have decided that there is room on this base for you to stay, and you are welcome to stay here as long as necessary, until we find a more suitable place for you all. We _will_ find you a home. But until then, you are welcome to stay here as long as you do so desire."

Louis and Zoey smiled while Francis nodded with Bill.

"All right!" Ellis said.

"I have been ordered to show you all to your designated rooms. I you will please accompany me."

The officer walked through the other closed door and led them down a series of corridors and rooms throughout the building. As they passed the firing range, Bill slowed down his walking and watched young trainees practice their tactics. He smiled faintly as a feeling of nostalgia swept over him. Nearby, there was a display case set up with photos taken of great generals that had been to that military base from America's history. Louis stared at the photos and smiled.

"There's got to be a ton of history on this base."

As the rest continued to follow, they went past other officers who were also making their way around the base. A young female in her uniform with her blonde hair tied into a neat bun and behind her cap walked past the group, catching Nick's attention.

"Hello there…" He said slyly as she passed. The woman's movement and mannerisms were unchanged.

"Looks like she wasn't interested." Francis joked.

"Oh I'll get her," Nick said proudly.

"Maybe she has a likeness for tough guys, not some wimp in a suit." Francis chuckled.

"Maybe she didn't look at you because of your gay looking vest." Nick smirked.

The group was then led up a flight of stairs to an upper floor, where there were eight rooms empty with a military grade bed and bathroom.

"These are where you will be staying; you may choose whichever suite you like. Each room has a single bed along with a working lavatory and shower. Directly beneath us is the base mess hall, where food will be provided. The building directly across from us is the library and rec. room. You are permitted to come and go to that building as you please. If there are no further questions, I will leave you to your rooms."

"Oh, I got one." Ellis spoke up. "Do you guys have like a pool or something around here?"

"Ellis, come on," Coach interrupted. "You don't ask stuff like that from…"

"It's quite all right." The officer said. We do have a pool, but it is not currently working. Once it is repaired and refilled, we will be sure to notify you."

"Oh, man. That's awesome." Ellis said with a big smile.

"If that is all, I shall return to my post."

"Thank you, sir. We'll take it from here." Bill said.

"Of course, sir." The officer said. He then turned and walked back down the stairs.

"Well," Nick said. "Everyone grab a room."

Ellis was the first to shoot toward a door.

"Oh man, look at this one. There's a window in this one!"

"I'd like one with a window." Rochelle said. "This one on the end has one too."

"Well," Zoey said. "Girls should probably stick together. I'll take the one across from you."

"Oh, but there's no window in that one." Rochelle said.

"Oh, it's okay. I like the dark." Zoey replied.

"I should take the other end." Coach said. "I don't want my snoring keepin' the whole house awake."

"I'll take the one next to Zoey." Francis said.

"Well, I suppose I should take the other end." Bill said.

"I'm fine with whatever everyone else doesn't want." Louis said with a smile.

"Well, I could take this one." Nick said as he walked toward one of the unclaimed doors. "I'm gonna be right next door to you, Ellis. So I don't want to hear you making any freaky noises at three in the morning."

"Well, I guess this one's mine then." Louis said.

"Oh, I cannot wait to take a shower!" Rochelle said.

"I'm gonna find the closest buffet table, take all that I can eat, and relax up there in my bed." Coach said. "Now where's that mess hall?"

"It's downstairs." Francis said. "Might as well go stuff my face." He said as he walked down the stairs and Coach followed.

"I'm going to find me a good book to lie down and read." Louis said as he headed toward the stairs.

"Let me know if there's anything good." Rochelle said as she walked into her room and closed the door.

"I'll be at the firing range, people." Bill said as he too began to go down the stairs.

"Does anyone know if there's a bar around here?"

"There might be one in the rec. room. I'm heading there to see if they've got any good video games or sci-fi movies."

"You like scary movies?" Ellis said enthusiastically. "Oh man, we gotta see what they got!"

"Yeah, let's head down there." Nick said. "You guys can to cuddle in the dark and watch movies, and _I_…am getting _hammered_."

"Well good luck with that." Zoey said. "C'mon Ellis, let's see if they've got any alien movies."

"Oh my God, you believe in Aliens too?"


	4. I Love The Goddamn Army!

It had been two weeks since the survivors were rescued, and everything had been quite a treat for them all. Since they weren't too social with the rest of the military, the eight had grown to be close in their own ways.

"Now THAT is a classic movie." Coach said.

"See?" Zoey said. "I told you I knew some awesome movies. And _nothing_ says classic like Ghostbusters."

Coach and Zoey left the corner of the rec. room where there were old video tapes and a worn down television set in front of a tattered couch. As they walked toward the other areas of the rec. room, they were stopped by Bill.

"Hey, would you two want to blow off some steam at the firing range for a little while?

"More 'male bonding'?" Zoey smirked.

"You could call it that." Coach said. "I'll do it. I ain't goin' into another apocalypse unprepared."

Coach and Bill headed out toward the other building.

In another spot in the rec. room, Louis, Francis, Ellis, and Nick were all playing poker.

"Ohh man," Ellis said. "This is tough."

"Have more beer, it'll toughen you up." Francis said.

"I don't know, man. One time my buddy Keith thought he could win a poker game by drinkin' a lot of beer, but all it did was make him go crazy and shit and he started eatin' all his winnings and started chokin' on the poker chips…"

"Ellis, for Christ's sake!" Nick interrupted. "Try working on your poker face, huh?"

"Man, I have GOT to meet this guy!" Francis said, laughing.

"Keith sounds like he gets himself into a lot of trouble." Louis said.

"All right guys, are we gonna play or not?" Nick said, slightly irritated.

"Well unless you're gonna pull a straight flush out of your ass like last time," Francis said, glaring at Nick. "Then I'm in."

"I'm in." Louis said as he added a poker chip to the massive chip pile in the middle.

"Ellis?" Nick asked.

Ellis paused for a moment, then looked at his cards and smiled.

"Yeah, I'm in."

"All right, I'm in, and I'll raise you $500." Nick said as he slid in a small stack of poker chips.

Francis smirked. "I'll see your 500, and raise $1000. How's that, pretty boy?"

"No way man, I fold." Louis said as he set his cards down.

"I'm in." Ellis said enthusiastically as he added his chips.

"You sure?" Nick asked slyly.

Ellis hesitated for a moment. "Yeah, I'm gonna keep going."

"All right, suit yourself." Nick said as he finished off a glass of beer next to him. He turned over toward a woman who was working in the rec. room.

"Hey sweetheart, how about another beer for me and the boys over here, huh?"

"Get it yourself." She said. "I'm not here to serve you."

"Well if you don't, then me and the boys here are going to have to get it ourselves and we don't exactly know where everything is here and I don't think you'd like us messing up your order of things very much, isn't that right?"

The woman sighed heavily out of frustration. She marched over to Nick and snatched the glass from his hand.

"Just this one time. You hear me? I'm still a cadet and have permission to use deadly force if necessary."

"Oh, I love it when you talk dirty, sweetheart." Nick winked at her.

Ellis and Francis chuckled at his answer.

The woman angrily stormed away and returned with four glasses of beer and set them next to each of them.

"There, now that's enough of it. Next time, I'll take it personal and be forced to take violent action."

"Oh, I love how kinky you are." He said as he smiled at her.

Louis looked away from the woman, slightly embarrassed.

The woman stormed out of the room and left the building in a huff.

"Cheers, gentlemen." Nick said as he took another sip of beer.

"You have an interesting way of treating women." Louis said with a hint of distaste.

"Eh, it's not something I'm proud of." Nick said as he shifted his position.

"You acted like that a lot at first," Ellis said. "But you got better over time."

Nick stopped and stared blankly at his cards. "Yeah, I guess I did."

"Are we playing or what?" Francis said as he began to chug his beer. "I don't know about you ladies, but I'm gonna win this jackpot."

"All right then, what do you got?" Nick said.

"I got Two Pair." Ellis said.

Francis gave a smug smile as he laid his cards down.

"Three of a Kind, read 'em and weep."

"Aw, shit man. That's cold." Ellis said. "Well what about you, Nick?"

Nick stared at his hand, a look of defeat in his eyes.

"Well boys…" he said as he put down his cards. "I got a Straight." He smiled as the others were angry at their loss.

"Aw, man." Ellis said. "That's the eighth time today, and now I'm broke. I'm out you guys."

"I don't believe this," Louis said. "I folded, and I had a goddamn Flush."

"Well that's Nick for ya." Ellis said with a smirk. "He's a gamblin' con man."

"No shit." Louis said. "Well I'm sure you've earned your rightful place by surviving this long."

"Yeah, I guess I've got some kind of angel lookin' after me." Nick said as he began to gather the cards to shuffle. He looked up to see Zoey, Bill, and Coach walk into the rec. room. Bill and Coach walked toward the group while talking to each other while Zoey stood looking around the place, then decided to walk over toward the bar that was behind the poker table along the wall.

"Hey there," A young man said to Zoey from behind the bar. "What can I get a pretty woman like you?"

"Do you do rum and coke?" she asked the bartender.

"For you, I can get you anything." He smiled.

"Thanks." She said.

"Hey Coach." Ellis said, you wanna take my spot in Poker? I'm all outta chips here."

"No, that's all right." Coach said.

"I'd be up for a game." Bill said.

"Here, you can take my place." Nick said as he stood up.

"What the hell are you leaving for?" Francis asked.

"Yeah, you've won almost every single game." Louis commented.

"Well, it was a hard lesson to learn but, I've come to realize that sometimes you've gotta quit while you're ahead."

"Amen to that." Coach said.

"Well if that's the case, we can start over then." Louis said.

"Oh cool, that means I'm back in." Ellis said.

"Excuse me, bartender." Bill asked the bartender. You wouldn't happen to have a box of fine cigars around, would you?"

"Of course, sir." The bartender said. "A fresh box right here for you sir." He said as he bent down behind the bar and pulled out a sealed cigar box and handed it to Bill.

"Thank you." Bill said. "Any of you guys want a light?"

"I'll take one." Ellis said.

"Hey Bill," Francis said. "Share the wealth."

"Of course, Francis." Bill said.

Bill passed the box around to all the guys.

"Well, shit." Coach said. "If you're all smokin' cigars and playin' a new round of poker, then count me in." He grabbed a nearby folded chair and sat at the poker table.

"Cigar, Nick?" Bill asked.

Nick smiled. "Yeah, what the hell."

Bill walked up to the bar and held the box by Zoey.

"How about you, Zoey?"

"Sure, what the hell." She said as she grabbed one. "Thanks, Bill."

"Whoa, you smoke cigars too?" Ellis asked Zoey.

She turned to face Ellis as she held onto her cigar between her index and middle finger, and drank her rum and coke.

"What, you don't have tomboys where you come from?"

"Well, no. Well, not like you anyway. All the girls where I'm from that are like the guys all work on farms and spit and stuff and have scary hair…"

"Ellis, you're blushing." Nick interrupted.

"I'm what?" Ellis said quickly as he turned to face the other guys, startled by Nick's comment.

All the guys laughed as Ellis smiled sheepishly and blushed.

Zoey smiled at Ellis. "Eh, it's okay. I'm not very common where I'm from either." She took another sip of her rum and coke and turn to face the bar.

Nick stared at Zoey, almost taken back by her comment.

"Hey Nick, you playin' or not?" Francis asked.

He looked at the five of them who were huddled around the poker table. Bill began passing a lighter around for the cigars.

"Nah, I'll sit this one out." Nick said. He turned toward the bar and sat on the stool next to Zoey.

"Give up on your poker game?" She asked.

"Yeah, I kicked everyone's ass the past bunch of rounds." He chuckled.

He looked at the bartender as he was cleaning some of the glasses.

"Hey, can I have a shot of Jack?"

The bartender nodded.

"So what's your deal then?" He asked Zoey. "You're young, stuck with three old guys, and you didn't go insane?"

"Depends on what you call 'insane'." Zoey replied. "It hasn't been easy to control my random nerdy outbursts, but aside from that, I'm fine."

"Right…" Nick said as he grabbed the shot that was just set in front of him. He quickly slugged down the shot and set the empty glass down on the bar.

"So you never had any like," He cleared his throat. "memorable moments with any of them?"

"Memorable?" Zoey asked with a look of disbelief.

"Well, I don't want to be caught talking to Biker Dude's girlfriend or anything."

"Oh, what's the matter, Nick? Afraid of being the little boy getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar?"

"Depends on whose cookie jar it is." Nick smiled mischievously.

Zoey stared at Nick.

"No." She said sharply.

"No what?" He said. "You're not attached to any of these guys?"

"I'm sorry," she said. "When was the part where this became something of your concern?" She said sarcastically.

"I'm just asking out of curiosity, to be sure that I'm not upsetting anyone."

"You mean anyone else." She shot back.

"Wow, you're really violent with your words."

"And… you're a jackass." She said with a smirk.

"Why thank you, that was incredibly necessary to do that." He said sarcastically. "Jesus Christ, you sound like my ex-wife."

"Maybe she was onto something." Zoey quickly replied.

"She was always whining and complaining about everything. She's a bitch."

"God, what a dick." She mumbled.

"I heard that." Nick said.

"Yeah, so did the church guy." Zoey said.

"Who the hell is that?"

"Look, you act like you're better than everyone else, and you don't care about anyone but yourself." She sighed. "For a moment, I actually thought you'd be someone worth talking to. But what the hell, I mean, if a Hell's Legion biker can actually bring himself to help us, then why can't some two-bit conman can do it too?"

She finished her rum and coke and stood up from her stool.

"Well I'm going back to my room. Alone." She said sternly. "Good night, Nick." She said sternly.


	5. There's Been A Change of Plans

It had been a little over a month since the eight were rescued by the military, all had seemed well at the time, but none of them knew how long it would last. Every waking morning seemed more relaxing and safer than the previous day, but as the feeling of safety grew more comforting, the feeling of dread and the thought of losing it all grew just as well.

Zoey stood in the hallway holding onto a VHS tape and looking around curiously. She sighed and shrugged when she couldn't find anyone she recognized. As she turned toward the living room, she saw Nick walk in and start to head to the bar when she quickly approached the only recognizable face.

"Yo, Nick." Zoey asked apprehensively. "You bored?"

"Well what the hell would you want with me?" He asked.

"I just wanted to ask if you wanted to see a movie with me."

"With You? You're what, half my age?" Nick asked.

Zoey sighed and shook her head. "Well we're in a zombie apocalypse, so it shouldn't matter much. I'd love to hang out with my graduating class, but they all tried to eat me." She said. "And no, I'm not." She added.

Nick sighed. "All right, fine. What do you got?"

"Well, I was thinking a good action movie would be cool, unless you're only into porn."

"Do you get this burst of total satisfaction every time you take a shot at me?"

"Hey, I'm just trying to make conversation."

Nick paused. "What did you have in mind?"

Zoey smiled. "Ever see Die Hard?"

Just then Ellis walked into the room and spotted Zoey.

"Oh, hey you guys! What are ya'll doin'?"

"Oh, we were just going to go watch a movie." Zoey said, slightly put off.

"Hey, cool! Can I join you guys?" Ellis asked.

"Uh… sure!" Zoey said, trying to sound enthusiastic. "Come on, you'll love it."

"Oh that's awesome. You pick some of the best movies ever, with lots of explosions and things…" Ellis said as he walked ahead of Zoey and Nick.

Nick stepped backward away from Zoey and Ellis, when Zoey turned around and grabbed onto Nick's shirt.

"Yeah, it'll be great to watch another movie with you, Ellis." Zoey said as she gave Nick a look of dread.

"You said you would." She whispered sternly.

"I don't believe it." Nick said quietly. "After all this time of you two hanging around together and you're scared to death of being alone with poor little Ellis." He smirked.

"He's a nice guy and all, but he doesn't have a clue about anything! Especially women…"

"So you're actually relying on my knowledge of the opposite sex to save you from the farm boy." Nick laughed. "You'll owe me."

"Fine," Zoey said. She let go of Nick's shirt. She glanced over Nick's shoulder to see Francis enter the building.

"Hey Francis!" Zoey shouted.

Francis stopped walking and turned toward the noise.

Zoey held up a videotape. "Wanna watch a movie?" she shouted across the room.

"That was smooth." Nick said.

"Thanks." She smiled.

Sitting in the Library, Rochelle was propped up on the couch reading a book. Her face was filled with remorse as she tore through the pages and immersed herself in the novel's story.

Louis came into the Library and saw Rochelle on the couch.

"Hey, what you reading?" Louis asked as he sat down in a chair facing the couch Rochelle was on.

"Oh, I finally got around to reading Of Mice and Men. It's a classic, yet I never actually found the time to read it until now."

"It is a very well written book." Louis said. "How far are you into it?"

"I just got to the part where their boss finds out that Lenny killed his poor wife." Rochelle said, slightly saddened. "And now they're talking about hunting him down and everything."

"Yeah, that's a really tough part to get through. Most of the book is." Louis said. He smiled. "There are some classics that don't end badly though. Take A Christmas Carol."

"Oh, I love Charles Dickens." Rochelle said. "He's very descriptive."

"Well there's a reason he put in so much detail. Back in the day, he wrote and submitted the chapters to his books to a local paper in London. He was paid by the word for his chapters, and decided to take full advantage of his talents, and their generosity."

"Wow, I didn't know that." Rochelle smiled.

Louis smiled back. "You learn something new every day."

"Sometimes I think these kids don't respect anything these days." Coach said to Bill as they sat playing cards. "They don't even refer to their parents as "mom" or "dad". They call them by their first names."

"It's a shame." Bill said as he looked over his cards. "In the military they taught you proper discipline, honor, and respect. But not everyone looked fondly on the military."

"Yeah," Coach chuckled. "Nowadays, they ain't got no choice. It's either respect the military, or die."

"And it's about time." Bill added. "Just when you thought most people would rather die, suddenly their views end up different."

"Oh HELL no!" Ellis shouted at the TV. "He did NOT just shoot the only guy named Ellis!"

"Sorry, dude." Zoey said. "That guy was an asshole and got what he deserved."

"True, true. He did give the bad guys all the stuff on McClane."

"I can't believe you made me waste my time on total shit like this." Nick said.

"Hey, John McClane is worth wasting any afternoon on."

"He's one guy going against a whole team of terrorists and cops, and wins. This is _not _realistic."

"But he is COOL." Ellis said. "McClane's my long lost hero!"

"I just liked the part where they blew up the SWAT Team's piece of shit hummer." Francis said.

"Just wait 'till he uses the C4." Zoey said.

"Hans brought C4 with him?" Ellis said.

"He's gonna use it to blow up the hostages. This guy is a genius!" Nick said.

Zoey smirked. "Glad everyone likes it." She paused. "I always liked Alan Rickman as Hans."

"Isn't he like, old and dead now?" Nick asked.

"Rickman's NOT dead, and it's not him, it's his character."

"So you're crushing on a fictional character."

"Oh, Jesus."

"Oh, SHIT! They're shootin' at him, they're shootin' at him!"

"You know useless entertainment, I'll give you that." Nick said.

"Does this mean you'll watch Ghostbusters with me?" She asked.

"No."

Later that afternoon, a scout atop the hotel was scanning for any activity of the infected when he spotted a small disturbance far ahead.

Across the plain of grass that seemed all calm, he looked out past the barbed wire fence that encased the perimeter and saw what seemed to be a small horde. He pulled out binoculars and stared deeply toward the section. He lowered his binoculars slowly in horror once he had realized what he had seen.

He quickly ran down the stairs toward one of the hotel rooms the military had converted into a monitoring station.

Inside the room stood a man in a General's uniform, looking over reports of recent activity when he turned to see the soldier quickly walk inside.

"General." He said. "There's something you should see."

The General stared at the soldier for a moment, then set down the report in his hand.

"What seems to be the problem?"

"Oh I hope this works." Ellis said. "You sure you know how to do this?"

"It's a freakin' bottle rocket." Francis said. "How hard can it really be?"

"You make 'em outta toilet cleaner, don't you? Oh man, those things sound like a gunshot when they go off, I sure hope the army doesn't get mad at us or anything."

"Nah, we're far enough away, they can't hurt us!" Francis said as he placed the bottle on the ground.

"All right, back up. Let's see this baby get airborne!"

After just a few more seconds, a loud shot was heard and the bottle shot straight into the air, landing about seven seconds later in front of the two.

"That… was AWESOME!" Ellis shouted.

"Yeah! I told you I could do it." Francis said. "You should have seen the shit I used to make to scare people away from our old biker hangout. I've never seen a white man shit himself and take off running like they did!"

"Gentlemen," Said the General to the soldiers in the briefing room. "We have an upcoming situation on our hands. Tonight, while our civilians are resting, it is our duty to prepare for the task at hand. We must gather all our firearms, explosives, and artillery that we can muster in just one night. You have until 0800 hours to complete this task. Whatever you do not get done in time we must learn to accommodate without. Are we clear?"

"Give me another one." Nick said as he leaned on the bar, staring at the empty glass in front of him.

The windows outside were dark, and the clock on the wall leaned towards 1:30 AM. The bar was empty except for the bartender and his only customer, Nick."

"I'm sorry, sir. But I think you've reached your limit." The bartender said.

"Well I haven't thrown up yet, so I think I'm good." Nick replied. He looked up at the bartender. "How would you know, anyway?"

"I'm one of the only members of the original staff that didn't become infected." He said as he poured Nick another drink. "This place used to be a hotel, you know."

"Heh," Nick said. "Explains why this place doesn't fit the army's style."

"The army turned it into a base when almost all others in the area were destroyed by the rise of infected from other rescued survivors."

"Must be tough." Nick said as he finished his glass.

"Yeah, it was hard to get used to, especially when the staff really cared about each other, and now most of them are gone." He said.

Nick nodded.

From atop the stairwell nearby, Zoey walked to the edge and spied on Nick at the bar. She stared at him with a look of concern as she quietly walked down the stairs.

"It was very hard to get used to." The bartender replied. "I used to like this girl that worked with housekeeping here, actually. She was very nice." He glanced at Nick as he began to clean the nearby counter. "What about you?"

Nick just stared at his empty glass. "I suppose I got these friggin' idiots to keep me going."

He looked away from the bar just in time to see a soldier walk up the stairs and toward the rooms that the survivors were staying in.

Inside, the survivors were sound asleep when a knock was heard on each and every door.

"We need everyone to get up right now!" A voice commanded.

The survivors quickly awoke and opened their doors to see the soldier standing with an announcement.

Nick stumbled up the stairs just in time to hear the announcement made.

"I apologize for waking you at such a late hour," The man said. "But it has come to my attention that we have a frightening situation on our hands. Just Northeast of us is a horde of infected that plan on overrunning this very base. We have no time to waste, and we must prepare to move out before the horde reaches this base. Pack up all personal effects and anything you will need to survive. If you don't need it, I urge you to leave it behind. We leave at eight o'clock in the morning, and you all must, I repeat, _must_, be ready or we _will_ leave you behind."

"Oh my God…" Rochelle said to herself.

"I hope you are ready when the time comes…" The officer said. "…and may God be with you all."


	6. Pilot's License, Revoked, DUN DUN DUN!

"Let's move, move, move!" A military officer shouted as nearby soldiers gathered their supplies. "I will NOT pick up after you!"

The eight survivors stood behind the line of troops, holding tightly onto the guns and supplies the military offered them. Dawn had begun to slowly line the horizon in the east, shining a light of warning. The survivors looked westward toward their destination, as their shadows darkened their path.

"What the hell got up this guy's ass?" Francis whispered to Louis.

"It looks like the military's having trouble holding out everywhere." Louis replied.

"As long as they leave us plenty of food and supplies, we'll be good to follow them."

"Just don't let Coach hold onto the food…" Nick said.

"Or Francis the supplies…" Rochelle added.

The officer approached the group.

"Well, I know I don't need to tell you how to handle yourselves out there or to be careful," He said. "But it would be best if you tried to stick with us for your own protection."

"Don't worry, we'll be fine." Bill said. "Lead on."

The officer nodded and continued to order the troops to hurry up.

"I've got the guns." Ellis said.

"And I've got the food." Rochelle said.

"I'll hold onto the explosives." Louis said.

"Everyone got their hand-to-hand weapons?" Zoey asked.

"I ain't lettin' go of my trusty fire axe." Coach said.

"I've got a Katana." Rochelle said.

"I'm sure there will be more where we're going." Louis said.

"Well what do you think, Louis?" Bill asked. "You got a good feeling about this one?"

Louis paused, thinking. "I'd say pretty good. I've got a good feeling that we'll get to where we're going, but I couldn't tell you about the way there."

"Let's just hope they know what the hell they're doing." Nick said. He made a face and felt his head with his hand.

"Hangover?" Zoey asked.

Nick gave her a look.

"All right, we should be ready to ship out within the next two hours." One soldier said.

"Sir!" Called another officer as he approached. "We have news on the infected!"

"Well, spit it out, sergeant!" The officer commanded.

"They have doubled their group size and have arrived sooner than we had expected!" He paused to catch his breath. "They are within our perimeter!"

The officer paused for only a moment.

"How long?"

The sergeant shook his head. "Minutes, sir."

The officer stood frozen for only a second, then turned to the survivors.

"It's time to get moving." He said as he walked away.

"Wait a minute…" Rochelle asked. "Did he say they were here?"

"That's what it sounded like." Bill replied.

Nick shook his head. "Not even the goddamn military could save us."

"I ain't ready to give up yet!" Coach said.

"Yeah, me either." Ellis added.

"We got no choice." Francis said. "I say we blow the fuckers up."

"Well guys," Zoey said. "I guess it's time to get ready."

Ellis emptied the gun bag onto the ground in front of the survivors as Louis removed the explosives from the bag and set them on the ground behind the guns.

"Well this is all too familiar." Bill said as he took a puff of his cigarette.

"Another gauntlet." Rochelle said.

"Hey there!" Shouted a soldier from a nearby military Humvee.

"You guys let me know when you're ready, and I'll drive you out of here!"

"What do we do?" Zoey asked. "Do we wait or do we go?"

"We'll just have to play it out." Bill said.

Zoey stared at the hummer. "I don't like this."

"Me either." Nick said.

"Let's grab some guns, people." Coach said. He walked up and grabbed an assault rifle along with Nick and Bill. Francis, Ellis, and Zoey grabbed a shotgun while Louis grabbed a sub-machine gun and Rochelle took a hunting rifle. They helped themselves to various explosives and melee weapons while Zoey and Nick each grabbed a Mangum pistol.

"All right, let's move out!" The officer shouted.

Right after, all the military vehicles filled with soldiers began to move. As the eight watched as their escort began to move, they ran for the humvee as fast as they could.

"A little northeast of here is where we're going." The soldier said. "If we stay close to the group, we will ensure our survival."

Rochelle took shotgun while Louis, Zoey, and Coach took the backseat. Holding onto the outside, Nick, Bill, Ellis, and Francis kept watch.

From behind them, all they could hear were the sounds of the neighboring vehicles, and the loud screeching roar of the horde only a few yards behind them.

"Holy shit!" Nick shouted.

"That is WAY too many damn zombies!" Ellis said.

"You ready for some fun?" Francis asked as he raised his shotgun.

Far behind them, the last humvee was still by the base in pursuit and it as well as the base was taken over quickly by the infected.

"See you on the other side, Francis." Bill said.

As the soldier navigated over bumpy terrain in line with the other vehicles, the three did their best to pick off what zombies they could.

As Coach, Zoey, and Louis sat in the back seat, they saw out of the side mirrors the mob of zombies run straight for them.

"Oh HELL no!" Louis said. "We can't just sit here!" He turned and aimed his assault rifle out the window past Nick and Ellis. On the other side, Coach began to throw Molotov coctails out the window to nearby areas.

The driver looked out the mirror and saw as hell began to engulf the terrain.

"Someone take the mini-gun up top!" He shouted. "Either that or someone drives!"

"We don't have time to switch!" Louis shouted.

"I've got it!" Zoey shouted.

She climbed upward to take control of the mounted gun atop the roof.

As she fired at the oncoming horde, the four guys quickly turned to stare as she fired rapidly past all of them.

"Well don't look at me! Shoot them!" She shouted.

She looked toward the horizon as the rest of them turned back toward the mass. Clouds began to block out the sunlight as the somber glow of gray lit up the sky all around them.

"This is NOT how this is going to end." Zoey said to herself.

"WATCH OUT!" Rochelle shouted.

From the horde ran up a big, enraged, hungry Tank. As the path the military took made a right turn, the Tank gunned straight forward and roared at the humvee three cars in front of the survivors.

As they all turned toward the sounds, they watched as the Tank raised its meaty claws and in one quick movement, slammed down the middle of the hummer, almost completely flattening the vehicle. The other cars in front of the survivors swerved and opened fire upon the Tank. In anger, the Tank lifted the wrecked hummer and threw it at one of the cars, causing shards of debris to shoot in all directions. One large metal piece of one of the hummer doors flew straight for the survivors and impacted the driver's side. The driver was stabbed with a sharp, jagged edge of the door piece as it shattered one side of the windshield and stabbed through the chest; he was killed instantly.

Rochelle let out a loud blood-curdling shriek at the soldier's sudden death and the quick loss of control over the vehicle.

The driver's death on the steering wheel caused the hummer to swerve, avoiding the Tank, but causing Zoey to fall back into the hummer and Ellis' hand to slip.

"AAH!" He screamed as he was flung backwards and off of the hummer.

"ELLIS!" Nick shouted in a panic as he reached his hand out to grab onto Ellis, only to have Ellis fall just out of reach.

"Turn us around!" Bill shouted.

"I can't, the driver's dead!" Zoey shouted.

"I can drive us," Louis shouted. "But we've got to get the driver out of the front seat."

"I can't get him!" Rochelle said. "I'm too scared, and I think he's pinned to the seat!"

Francis began to loosen his grip on the hummer.

"Where the hell do you think _you're _going?" Bill shouted.

"You can't just leave him to _die!_ I'm goin' in! Don't bitch old man; just come back and get us the hell out of it!"

And with not another second wasted, Francis jumped off of the hummer and landed hard on the ground. The dirt from the Hummer's wheels kicked up over him as he stood up slowly. He looked at the dirt on his vest and casually brushed it off as he began to scan the horizon.

As looked into the distance, he saw Ellis running and shooting at the mob as they began to surround him.

"Hang on, kid!" Francis shouted as he ran for Ellis.

"Watch out!" Coach shouted as he grabbed onto a crowbar from beneath the seat. "I'm gonna pry the metal out of the seat! I don't wanna hit nobody!"

He pushed the flat edge toward the sharp section of the metal and with leverage against the seat, pushed the metal shard out of the seat itself.

"It's out, shove him out!" He commanded Rochelle.

Rochelle kicked the driver's side door open and gingerly put her hand on the driver's shoulder. She gave him a push until the body fell out the open door onto the ground.

"Sorry!" She said as she pushed him. As the body fell out of the hummer, she winced at the thought of what she had done.

With the car slowing down as the gas petal was free, Rochelle tried to steer the hummer while holding onto the steering wheel from her seat.

"I've got it!" Louis said as the hummer came to a halt. He quickly opened the rear door and slammed it as he ran up to the front seat. He slammed the door and smeared the splattered blood off of the cracked windshield and steering wheel.

"We're going back!" Louis shouted.

"I'll cover you from here." Rochelle said as she picked up his assault rifle.

"I'm goin' up top!" Coach shouted. He climbed to he outside and went behind Nick.

"I've got this side covered." Coach said as he pulled out his AK-47.

""All right, I'll switch." Nick shouted as he quickly jumped down and latched onto the other side behind Bill.

"All right, let's go, what are we waiting for?" He shouted at Louis.

"I'm punchin' it!" Louis shouted as he hit the gas with all his might.

The three outside jerked with the sudden increase in speed and turned around to shoot forward as they now were heading straight for the horde.

As they drew near, Nick shot off two more rounds and his shotgun ran out of ammo. As he reached into his pocket to pull out more shells, they slipped out of his hand and spilled onto the terrain below.

"Shit!" He snapped. "I'm out of ammo, we got another gun down there?"

"There's another AK-47 down here." Zoey said.

"Great, whatever, just pass it the hell up here!" Nick commanded.

"Got it." Zoey said as she quickly grabbed the rifle from the driver's side floor by Louis.

"Here," She said as she handed it to Nick.

"Thanks," He said as he reached down for it.

"There they are!" Bill shouted as he pointed forward.

Coach leaned his head out of the window on the left side of the back seat and saw the two in the distance, still fighting for their lives.

"Don't worry guys, we're comin' for you." Louis said triumphantly.

"God I hope they're okay." Rochelle said.

In the middle of the largest horde that either party had ever witnessed, Francis and Ellis were on their last bit of energy as they hacked and blew apart one zombie after another.

"Watch out! Hunter!" Ellis shouted.

Francis turned toward where Ellis was looking only to be pounced instantly.

"Get off!" Ellis shouted as he punched the Hunter off.

Francis quickly stood back up and shot the Hunter point blank until he was dead.

"Thanks, man." Francis said. Not a moment later, Ellis was suddenly grabbed onto by a Smoker tongue and dragged into the horde.

"God DAMMIT!" Francis shouted. "I'm gonna take that tongue and shove it up your ass!" He roared as he held up his shotgun and shot the Smoker and the zombies off of Ellis. He reached down and helped Ellis up from the chaos.

"Thanks, man." Ellis said.

"I told you I'd take care of ya!" Francis asid.

Ellis looked behind them and as a smile grew on his face he pointed.

"Hey, hey, Francis! Look! They came back for us!"

"About damn time." Francis grumbled as he shot another zombie.

"Oh, shit!" Coach said as he gazed upon the size of the horde. "I hope they're still alive!"

"If I know Francis," Bill said. "He's probably trying to eat these bastards."

Nick smirked. "Sounds like Ellis."

As they pulled up to the other two, a Boomer emerged from the crowd, right in front of Francis. Without noticing until it was too late, Francis shot the Boomer at close range, coating himself and Ellis in bile.

"What the hell was that for?" Ellis shouted as he spat bile and wiped his face.

"God dammit!" Francis said. "You fat bastard!"

"Oh, gross!" Rochelle said.

"Come on!" Louis shouted. "Get in the truck, we've got you!"

Francis and Ellis began to make their way back to the chopper when more Special Infected rose from the crowd. A Hunter landed on Francis while a Jockey latched onto the back of Ellis' head.

"AAH! Get this humpin' thing off of me!" Ellis screamed.

Zoey saw Ellis as he began to be led back toward the horde and quickly pulled herself half out of the back right window with her Magnum drawn, aimed at the Jockey. As she pulled herself out, she bumped Nick's leg, causing him to lose balance for a second or two.

"What the-!" He said as he swayed. "Could you not bump me while I'm shooting!"

"Just shoot the damn Hunter and save Francis!" She shouted.

Nick aimed his assault rifle at the Hunter and shot it off before Francis was completely taken down. He slowly stood up and began to make his way toward the hummer.

Above, Coach fired upon the Jockey and saved Ellis. As the two ran for the hummer, Zoey slid to the other side of the hummer and opened up the left rear door.

"Come on!" She shouted. "You can make it!"

Zoey slid back over to the other side by Nick as Ellis climbed in first and Francis right behind. He slammed the door shut and turned toward Louis.

"Let's get out of here! Pedal to the metal!"

"You got it!" Louis said as he quickly made a U-turn and sped away from the horde as fast as he could.

Behind them, the zombies began to chase the humvee down, but were not fast enough. As the survivors sped in the direction the military was last seen, they hoped and prayed that they could catch up to them, or at least make it to where they were going. The grayed sky seemed to symbolize a bleak future, but a little rain was not enough to slow them down or keep their spirits from hoping for a brighter tomorrow.


	7. I've Got A Good Feeling About This!

"I'm sorry guys," Louis said. "I don't even know where we are, or if this is even the path the military took."

"It's all right," Coach said. "You did your best."

"Yeah." Zoey commented. "I'm gonna miss the Fun-Vee."

"It's alright, man." Ellis said. "I've run out of gas too."

"First Aid in the trunk." Francis said as she shoved the back of the Hummer open.

"The driver said the base was northwest." Rochelle said. "Maybe we should start walking northwest."

"Yeah, anyone got a compass?" Nick said sarcastically.

"We should be able to travel all right as long as it's daytime." Louis said.

The group decided to head through the grassy plain over patches of rough terrain, and down the path toward a forest area.

"Good luck finding the sun in this weather." Zoey said as she looked up. "It looks pretty cloudy."

"Hey, we've traveled through a little rain." Coach said.

"Yeah, and we've also traveled through a_ lot_ of rain." Nick said.

"Oh, it was bad." Ellis commented. "We had to go through swamps, a hell of a sweet carnival, a broken bridge…"

"We've been through a lot ourselves." Louis said. "We've been through abandoned cities, infected hospitals…"

"And sewers." Francis cut in.

"And we traveled across a whole ruined airport, and through the whole town of Riverside."

"I hate sewers." Francis said.

"Sounds like a bumpy ride." Nick said.

"I'll never forget it." Zoey said. "We went through subway stations, tracks, train yards, towns, farmhouses…"

"How about swamps?" Ellis said.

"We've done some really gross sewers." Zoey said. "Same difference."

"How about a graveyard? Those things are scary with all them zombies."

"We've been in a church right next to a graveyard at night. It was really creepy, especially with this really annoying church guy."

"I hate that guy." Francis said.

"Well don't worry, he's dead." Zoey said.

"Good. Him and his goddamn bell."

The survivors finally reached the forest and gingerly walked in through a worn path down the middle. As they carefully stepped on crunching leaves and brushed against low branches, they hoped their sounds would not bring them much trouble.

"We've met some really nice people in our crazy travels." Rochelle said.

"We've met a few nice people here and there." Louis said.

"We met a real nice pilot once." Francis said. "But Zoey had to go and shoot him."

Zoey just sighed in frustration.

Suddenly Bill stopped walking. He looked around the horizon and thought.

"We haven't really had any trouble since we ran out of gas."

"It must mean we're coming up on something bad." Zoey said. "It usually does."

"Ten bucks says it's a Tank." Nick said.

"We'll judge that when we hear something first." Louis said. "Usually the big guy makes big noises."

"All right, break time guys." Francis said. "I gotta piss like a freakin' racehorse."

Nick gave him a funny look. "You're gonna do that out here, now, in the wilderness? Like, behind a tree or something?"

"Yeah."

"By yourself?" Rochelle asked.

"No way I'm taking any of _you ladies_ with me. What the hell's so scary about doin' that alone?"

"Well be careful you're not attacked." Zoey said. "You don't want a horde to get you and bite your dick off." She mocked.

"Aah!" Ellis said as he imagined the pain and winced.

Zoey and Louis laughed as Rochelle snickered.

"Hey, at least I can watch and protect myself." Francis said triumphantly. "You're the one who's gotta bend over and deal with the horde doing weird things behind you…"

"Okay, that's not funny." Zoey said quickly.

Rochelle made a grossed out face and turned away.

"All right, that's enough." Bill said. "Are we moving, or what?"

"Fine, I'll wait for us to get out of the woods and do it behind a bush or something close so you all can watch."

"Thanks for thinking about us, Francis." Bill said sarcastically.

Suddenly from atop a nearby tree the screaming cough of a Smoker rang out through the trees and alerted the survivors.

"Come on, show yourself." Nick said quietly.

Rochelle pulled up the scope on her sniper rifle and looked through the visible treetops and branches, unable to see anything. As soon as she lowered her gun away from her, a Smoker's tongue shot out from the trees and wrapped tightly around Rochelle.

"Help me!" She shouted as she was quickly pulled upward.

"Rochelle!" Ellis shouted.

Everyone opened fire on the Smoker just as the screeching of a hunter nearby caused the survivors to grow nervous.

The Hunter leapt toward the survivors and pinned Coach on the ground.

"Get this thing off me!" He shouted.

Louis heard his shouting and quickly turned and shot the Hunter off of Coach.

"You okay?" Louis asked as Coach slowly stood up.

"I'll be fine. Thanks for the help." Coach said as he patted Louis on the shoulder.

The Smoker exploded in the treetop as Rochelle fell flat on the ground.

"I got ya." Bill said as he helped her up. "You all right, kid?"

"Yeah, I'll live." Rochelle said.

As they pushed forward, they finally got to a clearing in the woods. All that lay on the ground were patches of grass, brush, and few fallen leaves. Ahead, a small wall of rock stood before them with a hollow in the middle. Built in that hollow was an abandoned building, ruined by the infection.

"Finally! A freakin' bush!" Francis exclaimed. "Just give me a minute, will ya?" He said as he started walking toward the bush.

"Only two taps, Francis. We don't have all day." Nick said as he glanced at his watch, looking impatient.

Zoey gave him a look. "Oh, you're gross."

Ellis started laughing.

"That was good, Nick. That was good." He said as he held his hand up. "High five on that one."

Nick gave Ellis a high five just as Francis emerged from behind the bush.

"All right, let's go in."

As they approached the building they could see a lock was tightly put on the door.

"Looks like they tried protecting themselves from the invasion." Coach said.

"All they did was keep the building from letting any survivors in." Bill replied. "With this line of rock blocking us in, looks like we got no choice."

Louis looked at a sign posted on the wall next to the door. It read: "Only those with proper authorization code may enter. Any incorrect code or forced entry will sound alarm."

Beneath the sign between the wall and the lock over the door was a small keypad. On the left was a lever to pull for emergencies.

"We can pull it," Bill said. "But it'll make a hell of a racket."

"An alarm," Nick said. "This ought to be good."

"We're gonna have to pull the lever," Coach said. "Then get to the security station inside to turn it off."

"Sounds like a plan to me." Bill said.

Ellis looked at Zoey. "You ready?"

"Oh yeah, I'm ready." Zoey replied.

"Yeah, let's do it." Francis said.

Rochelle nodded in agreement next to him.

"All right, let's pull the switch and start this shit up." Nick said.

Bill nodded.

Coach grabbed onto the lever and pushed with all his might to get the switch to move downward. As the hinge gave resistance with weathering and age, the switch finally gave and snapped into downward position; causing the alarm to sound and the horde not too far behind it.

"They're coming!" Louis shouted.

"Get ready." Zoey added.

In a wave, like water, the infected poured and weaved through the trees and rushed toward the survivors.

Francis glanced at the door as it slowly released the lock.

"Come on, come on!" He said impatiently.

They opened fire on the infected, shooting them before they got too close. As some of the zombies closed in and began to claw at them, they shot them off their fellow survivors attempting to save them. Amidst the chaos, the eight all learned to fully trust each other and work as a team; as one.

As the horde continued to run for them, Zoey looked next to her at Ellis.

"Hey," she said. "Wanna blow some of these things up?"

"Hell yeah!" Ellis said as he fired his auto shotgun into the horde. "Light 'em up!"

The two reached into their pockets and pulled out Molotov coctails. They lit the edges and gave them a toss. The fire blanketed most of the area in the woods where the zombies were coming from. However, some were still occasionally slipping by while their neighbors stumbled and fell as they burned to death.

The horde began to quickly run through the unlit path straight toward Rochelle. She saw the chaos and gasped as she panicked.

Francis ran up alongside her and pulled her close for protection as he fired his shotgun at the incoming zombies.

Nick and Louis stood next to each other as the fire died down and the zombies once again were coming out of the woodwork.

A small group began to claw at Nick, causing him to lose his balance and be knocked forward into the group.

"Oh, shit!" He shouted. Suddenly, Louis grabbed onto his shoulder and prevented him from falling into the horde.

"Easy there." He said. "You gotta keep your balance!"

"Right." Nick nodded. "Thanks a lot."

Francis went up to the door, turning occasionally to shoot a zombie off of him, and kicked the door in.

"Get inside!" He called.

The other seven quickly followed, with Bill being the last one in as he tried to cover the others.

Louis ran up to the security panel in the back room and flipped a switch with the words "Disable Alarm" above it. Instantly, the alarm sound was turned off, and the survivors shot the last of the large horde as they clawed their way in.

As the last of the zombies died, the group stood in silence, catching their breath.

"Let's see if there's another way out of this place." Bill finally said.

"A-frickin'-men." Francis said. "If I see another one of these vampires…"

"They're _zombies_, Francis!" Bill corrected.

"Whatever."

"Let's get moving." Coach said. "Maybe there's a stash of supplies around here."

"Sorry Coach, I don't think there's any food left in this dump." Nick said.

"You never know." Coach said.

Zoey stepped out of the security room and glanced to the right.

"Hey Bill, it's your favorite: stairs."

"Oh boy…" Bill said disappointedly.

As they began to make their way down the stairs, they heard the echoes of sorrowful, yet almost human crying.

"Well Nick, I guess you were right." Zoey said. "Something big was coming for us."

"This is _not_ what I had in mind." Nick said.

"Oh that's nothing, let's just shoot her in the back of the head or something."

"Oh no, I'm not getting that close to that crying bitch." Rochelle said.

"It can't be that bad." Francis said as he went down the stairs wit the rest following closely behind.

The Witch still sat in her position, crying, unaware.

The other survivors began to hug the walls of the room, trying not to aggravate the Witch.

Francis kept his shotgun drawn, stood in a position, and suddenly he quickly ran up and took a shot.

The bullet grazed the Witch's head, startling her. As she quickly stood up, Francis shot her once more between her glowing red eyes. As she shrieked in pain, she fell to the ground, contorted in an odd position, with her arms and long claws extended. Nick and Ellis walked up to him to examine his work.

"Hey," Francis said. "She looks like my ex-girlfriend when I told her she was fat."

Francis, Nick, and Ellis all laughed.

Rochelle turned around when she heard the comment and gave the three a look.

Nick cleared his throat and straightened out his blazer while Ellis fixed his hat and looked another way. Francis just looked down at his shotgun, all three pretending to be distracted with other things.

Rochelle rolled her eyes and continued to walk.

"All right," Coach said as he stood in the doorway of one of the rooms. "We got a kitchen!"

Zoey followed Coach in and into a pantry room off the kitchen, with Nick right behind her. The room was darkened as it had no windows, and everything was wooden paneled and had broken jars and cans scattered all over the shelves, as if it was all carelessly knocked down and destroyed.

"Wow," She said. "There's so much stuff in here."

"Smells rotten." Nick said.

"What is all this for, anyway?" She asked.

"Beats the hell out of me."

Suddenly a small thump was heard from the door at the other end of the pantry. In alarm, Nick and Zoey drew their pistols and aimed cautiously at the door. Carefully, Zoey walked up to the door and stood against the wall alongside the knob.

She held her pistol to the door as she slowly put her hand on the knob.

"Wait!" Nick said.

Zoey glanced at Nick.

He nodded. "All right, open it up." He aimed his gun at the door.

Slowly, Zoey turned the knob and swung the door open toward her.

"Oh my God." She said, surprised.

"What?" Nick asked, his gun still drawn. "What is it?"

"Look at all the junk food!" She said as she swung the door open.

Lining the shelves in the pantry closet were snack cakes and bags of chips.

"Who'd have guessed that shit like this would survive a zombie apocalypse?"

"Figures." Nick said, annoyed. He lowered his gun and put it back in its holster.

"Oh my God! Ellis said as he stepped in the pantry and saw the closet.

"Hey Coach!" Ellis shouted. "We got Twinkies!"

Bill, Rochelle, and Louis were busy looking over a small library the building had.

"Finally, some maps of the area." Bill said. "We're gonna need this if we plan to catch up to the military."

He pulled out a roll of paper stuffed into a corner and unrolled it to see the marked locations.

"Here, this must be where we are." Bill said as he pointed to an area with a bright red dot on it. "It's not indicated as anything specific on the map."

"This must be where the old base was at." Rochelle said as she pointed to a nearby area.

"And the military must be…" Louis said as he searched the map over. "Here, right on the edge of Texas and Oklahoma."

"It's a hell of a long shot." Bill said. "But it's worth a try."

"We'll probably come across a few other signs about the base from somewhere." Rochelle said. "Maybe they're in a place we'll recognize."

"Well this is definitely worth keeping." Bill said as he rolled up the map. "Now we've got to get to a safe room before those bastards break that damn bolted lock up there."

"Hey guys, I found a couch!" Francis shouted.

"Where was that?" Bill shouted.

"Over here, in the safe room."

Bill sighed. "Where did you find the safe room?"

"What the hell you asking me for? I just found the damn thing, I didn't write it down or anything!"

"Well, it's worth staying here for the night." Louis said.

Louis, Rochelle, and Bill started looking for Francis when they passed the kitchen where Coach had a mound of cupcakes and Twinkies that he and Ellis were eating from while sitting on the table in the middle of the room. Nearby, Zoey and Nick sat on the counters laughing at Coach's obsession over food.

"That's right," Coach said as he unwrapped another Twinkie. "I'm a one man Twinkie apocalypse. Those zombies better watch out, when I'm on sugar, I'm on the jazz now!"

"Jesus Christ, how many has he eaten already?" Zoey asked sarcastically.

Nick shook his head. "I don't know, but we should hide these for when we're fighting the zombies. Just throw one in the middle of a horde for him to chase after it and he'll push through the zombies like he's a goddamn football player."

Zoey laughed. "I can see that."

"Hey, these are some damn good Twinkies right here." Ellis said. "The only food that can survive an apocalypse is Twinkies."

"The only mystery worse than how Twinkies survive the zombie apocalypse, is how Ellis survives eating them." Zoey said.

"He's a redneck." Nick said. "He probably gnaws on wild animals for fun."

"When he's sober, of course." Zoey shot back.

"Sober? Oh come on! I do NOT want to see this kid drunk. Do you?"

"Well you know what they say. 'The deep south: where men are men and sheep are scared.'"

"Ugh." Nick moaned while he began to laugh.

"Hey guys, we found a safe room!" Rochelle said in the doorway. "Well, Francis found one, but we don't know where he is right now."

"I'll find him." Ellis said. "Hey, Francis!" He called with a mouthful of Twinkie as he jumped down from the table. "Y'all want a Twinkie or somethin'?"

"I ain't gettin' up to get it." Francis yelled back.

"Well be careful," Zoey shouted. "Ellis just might bring the whole mound of it to you."

"All right!" Francis said enthusiastically. "'Bout time somebody waited on me."

"We should get ready to camp out." Coach said as he slowly got down from the table. "It'll be dark soon."

Ellis grabbed a handful of Twinkies as he stuffed one in his mouth and carried it with him toward Francis' voice. Louis, Bill, and Rochelle followed. Coach started to walk toward the group, then stopped and quickly walked back into the kitchen to snatch up anther Twinkie and walk out.

Nick got down from the counters and held his hand out to help Zoey down from the counters.

"Thanks." She said as she got down. "God, I'm tired. We've been walking all day with barely any stops. I'm beat."

"You learn to survive moving for a long time on little sleep in stuff like this." Nick said. "It's probably not going to get any better." Nick walked in front of Zoey and headed toward the kitchen door.

"That is _way_ too many sweets." Zoey said as she passed the pile.

"It's making me sick just looking at it." Nick said.

"Well don't feel too bad, we're finally getting a chance to rest and relax. Doesn't that sound nice?"

"Somehow in these safe rooms it's a little hard feeling completely 'safe'."

"I guess you just get used to it." Zoey said. "We better get back with the group, if we're alone too long we leave ourselves vulnerable."


	8. A Time to Rest

"There's got to be a way around it." Coach said as he continued to look at the map over Bill's shoulder. Tightly grasped in his hand was a half-eaten twinkie.

"I ain't goin' through another patch of woods before we get to where we're going."

"I hate the woods." Francis said. "Can't we just walk around it?"

"It's impossible unless we take a few extra days for it." Bill said. "The best way between us and the military is a straight line, and the woods are right in the middle of it."

"God dammit." Francis grumbled.

Zoey sat in the corner huddled together, shivering. Near her was a small fire going where Ellis and Rochelle were heating up scavenged cans from the kitchen for food. On the other side of the safe room was a desk where Bill had the map spread out as he looked it over. Next to him stood Coach as he kept munching on a twinkie, who was also trying to figure out the group's next possible choice.

On one side of the room was an old worn couch where Nick lounged over one side and the middle, while Zoey stayed huddled on the other side trying to keep warm. Across from them was a set of trashed lounge chairs that Francis and Louis were in. Louis staring at the fire as Ellis and Rochelle kept working and Francis was looking around the room for amusement.

"Perfect, our first hot batch of…something." Rochelle said as she scooped out some of the concoction into a stained bowl from a pile of bowls and spoons in similar condition next to her.

"Here, here I'll take this." Ellis said as he took the bowl from Rochelle.

He stood up and walked over toward Zoey with the bowl and a smile.

"Hey," He said as he knelt in front of her. "Hey, I got this for you."

Zoey looked up at him.

"Yer shiverin' and I don't want you to get a cold or somethin'."

Zoey smiled. "Thank you."

Nick eyed Ellis' behavior curiously.

Zoey carefully took the bowl from Ellis and started eating.

"Hey, you want me to find you a blanket or somethin'?" He asked.

Zoey shook her head. "No thanks, but I appreciate it. I'll be fine."

Ellis nodded and went back to sit by Rochelle, who was dishing out the food for the rest of the survivors.

As Ellis and Rochelle passed around the food, Francis tried to strike up conversation.

"I swear to God, if any of you jackasses beef tonight while I'm sleeping, I'll kill you."

"Thanks for the warning, Francis." Bill said sarcastically.

Louis began to think to himself while he ate, and then suddenly smiled.

"Hey, I've got a great idea." He paused to make sure he had everyone's attention. "What was one of the greatest moments of your life before the infection?"

The group sat in silence as they continued to eat.

"Well shit," Coach finally said. "I guess I'll go first." He smiled. "After working hard on keepin' the youth in line, after a while I started to think hat what I said didn't matter to the young'uns. But one day, after one of my health classes where I taught the kids about teen peer pressure and suicide, one of my students came up to me and asked for a private moment. He told me some kids were really pickin' on him and he couldn't take it, but my words saved that kid from committin' suicide. I saved a kid's life."

"Wow." Zoey said.

"That's great, Coach!" Rochelle said.

"And they said my career gave out with my knee." Coach said with a smirk.

"Well you didn't give up, and that's great." Louis said. "Anyone else want to share?"

"I've got one." Nick said. "I got an inside tip on one of the horses at a race I was bettin' on. Best tip I ever got. The bastard landed me _ten grand_." He said with a smug smile.

"No shit." Louis said, impressed.

"Holy shit." Rochelle said.

"You lucky bastard." Bill said.

"Jesus, Nick!" Ellis said. "What'ja do with it all?"

"Where the hell do you think this nice suit came from?" he said as he tugged on his blazer. "What's left of it, at least…" He said solemnly.

"Oh, I got one! Can I go next?" Ellis asked. "Okay, now you know I work on cars, right? Well this guy came in and asked just for me to work on his car, right? So I thought it'd be just a regular ol' pile o' junk but it wasn't. It was a mustang. A real classic, first one made EVER mustang! I mean I wasn't jus' workin' on a car I mean I got to work on a piece o' art right there. I wanted to carve my name into the frame, but that's just desecratin' it right there."

"Not bad." Coach said. "That's one hell of an automobile."

"It's quite valuable." Nick added.

Ellis turned to his right at Rochelle. "What about you, girl?"

"Who, me? Oh, I don't know…" Rochelle said.

"Oh come on," Louis said. "There's got to be something."

"Well, there was this one little thing." She paused. "My first real reporting story; it wasn't a real big one, but I interviewed a few school kids that were making paper flowers for their moms for Mother's Day. It was a cute little art project and all the kids enjoyed it. But there was this one girl who when I interviewed her, she said she didn't have a mommy. So I asked her who she was going to give the flower to, and she stuck her hand out and gave it to me."

"That's a great memory." Louis said. "I bet that made you feel great."

"Not everyone has good memories," Nick said. "I had a hell of a divorce. She tried taking everything I had, but I wouldn't let her. My lawyer got her to leave quietly, well… with the proper leverage."

"There's got to be someone who did something worth calling an actual accomplishment." Zoey said.

"I got a medal once," Bill said. "I got a Purple Heart in 'Nam for taking a bullet for our commanding officer."

"Wow, that's impressive!" Louis said.

"That's quite an honor, sir." Ellis said.

"Thank you." Bill said.

"What about you, Francis?" Louis asked.

"I don't know," Francis said. "I did something. I just don't care to remember." He paused. "Well there was this one time that these assholes came in and thought they could rob the bar that me and my buddies were in. These guys just broke out of prison and everything. They thought they could order us around."

"What happened?" Nick asked.

"Look man, you don't mess with me, all right? You're gonna get yourself killed. These guys just didn't get it. So one of them's got a freakin' shotgun to my head and thinks that since he's got these tattoos that mean he's on death row's gonna scare me. The dumbass actually got nervous when I told him I could beat him to death myself, and I did." He smiled evilly. "The cops never found him or his buddy. My boys and I buried 'em alive."

"Now that is some shit worth bragging about." Nick said.

"You want to talk about shit to brag about?" Louis said. "I was just about to quit my job at the IT department, but come to find out, my boss, the wonderful penny-pincher he was, was cutting bonuses and _not_ giving me and my colleagues a raise. Why? Because the place was about to go under, and they were going to pin it all on my department!"

"What did you do?" Nick asked.

"I found out about this and just before I quit, not worrying about my reputation, I brought the evidence to the authorities. Of course, they had other things to worry about at the time, the infection for one. But I almost had them on charges, and that would have been a sweet revenge."

"Damn, we all got some pretty awesome stories here." Ellis said.

"Well hey, what about Zoey?" Coach asked.

"Yeah," Rochelle said as she looked at Zoey. "What about you?"

Zoey sat in silence for a moment while she thought.

"I…uh…" She sighed. "I don't have one."

"Oh, bullshit." Nick said.

"Come on, you've got to have something." Rochelle said.

"Somethin' had to make ya smile." Ellis said.

Zoey continued to shake her head. "No… I can't think of much of anything. I mean, I was happy, but nothing really amazing ever happened to me. I was just…there."

"Aww, that's a shame." Rochelle said.

"Don't give up on it that easy." Louis said.

Bill, Ellis, Coach, and Nick just stared at her.

"I did nothing my first semester of college but watch movies and play Half Life the whole time. I didn't get anything done and I just got the chance to live through Gordon Freeman."

"There must have been something good goin' in your life." Coach said.

"In my whole life, I'd actually have to say, the best moment of my life was meeting you guys."

"Well it's a damn good thing we stuck together." Bill said.

"Glad I got to meet you too." Coach said.

"You're seriously happy with knowing these jackasses?" Francis asked. He smiled lightly. "Well you'd better stick around a little longer."

She smiled. "Thanks Francis."

"Don't worry, we'll make yer time with us fun." Ellis said. "We're almost all like family now."

"So don't waste it and wander off and get yourself killed, all right?" Nick said to her.

She smiled. "Thanks, guys."

"Well I hate to cut this short," Bill said. "But we've got a big day ahead of us, people. Time to get some shut-eye."

"You're probably right." Rochelle said. "Well, I'll take the chair over here if that's okay." She got up and walked to a worn chair in the corner.

"Yeah, I've got to get comfortable." Zoey said as she swung her legs onto the middle of the couch, kicking Nick.

"All right, lights out." Bill said as he blew out the fire. "Good night, Louis."

"Good night, Bill." Louis said. "Good night, Coach."

"Good night, Ro." Coach said.

"Good night, Zoey." Rochelle said.

"G'night, Nick." Ellis said.

"Good night, John Boy." Nick said sarcastically.

Zoey laughed.

"Night, Francis." Zoey said.

Francis belched loudly.

Everyone laughed.


	9. One Bullet At a Time

"Let's go, get up people!" Bill shouted. "We're burning daylight, we've got a lot of ground to cover."

The survivors slowly got up and grabbed onto their guns and ammo as they stretched and stock up on first aid, pills, and explosives.

"We have no choice." Bill said. "Either we take the woods, which could be very dangerous, or we take this other path that leads through this building complex. Either way, we leave ourselves to chance getting separated or ambushed by these bastards."

"I think the woods would be little more dangerous than the buildings, don't you?" Zoey said.

"I like her idea." Coach said. "We might have a better chance that way than we do in the woods. We could get lost if not too careful."

"Sounds good to me." Bill said. "After the small town, there's a bridge leading out of here and across state lines. If we can get there within the next couple of days, we'll be very close to catching up with the military."

"Then let's not waste any more time just standing around." Nick said.

Ellis kicked the safe room door open and began shooting the straggling zombies around the entrance.

"There!" Bill said as he pointed toward a worn path in the grass. "The town is off this way, by the road."

"We better start getting' movin'." Coach said. "Take full advantage of the daytime."

As the survivors followed the road, they ended up near a patch of farmhouses. One of them had an empty field that showed the town over the nearby hill.

"Let's search the farmhouse and barn for supplies." Bill said.

Suddenly the survivors heard a low gurgling sound echo through the house.

"I do not like that sound." Zoey said.

Ellis approached the front door of the house and slowly opened it up and was greeted by a face-full of boomer bile.

"Aahhh!" He shouted.

Behind him Bill and Francis also got coated.

"Ah, shit!" Francis shouted. "Fat bastard!"

Zoey, Coach, and Louis quickly ran up to defend them from the oncoming horde while Rochelle and Nick stood outside spread out to catch all other infected.

Zoey stood next to Francis and fired on the swarming infected. Suddenly the boomer stepped in front of the horde and Zoey refrained from shooting. Francis, still unable to see, kept shooting.

"No no no, wait!" She shouted. "Francis! Don't-"

The Boomer ran up to Francis only to be shot in the stomach blindly by Francis and explode all over Zoey.

"…shoot…" Zoey said, annoyed. She wiped her face with her sleeve and began to shoot the zombies that were now swarming for her.

Nick was outside shooting the horde when suddenly he was snared by a Smoker's tongue and dragged up toward the roof, where he was caught on the roof edge and out of the Smoker's hands, but still constricted.

"God dammit! The bastard's got me!" He shouted.

Bill saw Nick in distress and fired his M16. As he killed the Smoker, the thick, green cloud began to slowly creep outward and spread across the rooftop as Nick safely landed on the ground.

Zoey walked outside to avoid the horde that was crawling through and damaging the house. Below her she suddenly felt like she was standing in burning acid.

"Hey, watch out!" Ellis shouted. "Spitter goo!"

"What?" Zoey asked as she quickly ran from where she was standing.

"Spitter!" Ellis pointed onto the roof next to the Smoker.

"Oh God…" Zoey said. "They're getting worse!" She opened fire onto the Spitter, killing her with her shotgun.

The horde still swarmed, but in smaller numbers inside the house. Nick, Ellis, and Zoey ran back inside to get rid of the infected.

As zombies began charging toward them, Zoey took out her pistol and began getting headshots on oncoming infected. One of them ran quickly past Zoey, causing her to miss her shots. She continued to fire quickly in determination, leaving bullet holes following the zombie as it ran toward Nick. Finally a headshot stopped the zombie from its rampage. Zoey looked to see Nick with his Magnum drawn and realized she missed.

He looked at her in irritation.

"Hey sweetheart, could we not shoot each other?"

"Sorry!" She said. "Panic fire."

As the last of the zombies were down, the team began to loot the houses.

"Oh gross," Ellis said. "We've got a bile jar here."

"A bile jar?" Louis asked. "From Boomers?"

"Yep." Ellis said. "You throw it on the zombies, and they attack themselves! It's great!"

"I'd love to try it on a Tank." Louis said.

"I'd love to try it on a Boomer!" Francis said. "Or a witch."

"No! Don't throw it on a witch, whatever you do!" Ellis said. "I almost lost my arm because of it. She gets pissed!"

"Note to self." Louis said.

"Ah! What the hell?" they heard someone shout.

Ellis glanced through the nearby window to see a Hunter had pounced on Nick.

"Shit, Hunter's got Nick!"

Ellis and Zoey quickly ran outside and shot at the Hunter, but missed.

"Shoot it! God dammit!" Nick shouted.

Zoey ran right up to the Hunter as Ellis continued to shoot and attempted to shove the Hunter off. As she shoved the Hunter away from Nick, she lost her balance and fell straight down onto Nick. Ellis kept his shotgun barrel aimed at the Hunter and killed it as it stumbled away from Nick.

Zoey looked at him in surprise as she quickly stood up.

"You okay?" She asked, embarrassed.

"You're pretty bold to make a move like that in broad daylight." He smirked.

She shook her head.

"You're sick."

He laughed.

She stepped away from him. "You're a sick, and perverted asshole."

"Just when I thought we were getting along." Nick said sarcastically.

"Let's go people!" Bill shouted as he exited the house. "The town's just on the other side of this hill!"

The group followed Bill and Coach as they slowly walked their way down a steep hill and down into a small creek separating the farmland from the small town.

"I hate small towns." Francis said as he stepped out of the water.

"I thought you hated the water." Louis said.

"I do hate the water." Francis said.

"I'm searching the homes." Rochelle said.

"Good idea." Coach said as he joined.

"We've got machetes here!" Rochelle shouted.

Suddenly a screeching sound was heard and not a second later a Hunter leapt from behind a building and straight for Bill.

"Hunter!" Ellis shouted as she shoved and shot the Hunter off of Bill.

"You all right?" he asked Bill as he helped him up.

"Most of this blood ain't mine." He said as he brushed the dirt off of his coat and picked up his gun. "They haven't beat me yet."

Suddenly another deep roar was heard nearby.

"This one's mine!" Francis shouted.

"Charger!" Nick shouted. "Back the fuck up!"

"Come here, you oversized pussy!" Francis stood with his shotgun aimed right for him.

"Francis, what the hell are you doing?" Nick shouted as he stepped aside.

"Watch and learn, pretty boy." He said.

Just as the Charger came close to Francis he stepped aside only once and shot the Charger in the head as he passed by.

The Charger flinched and turned toward Francis again. He shot once more into its head, killing the Charger. As it fell over, Francis walked up to the body and put his foot over it and rested his shotgun over his shoulder.

"Now THIS is mine." He said with a smug smile.

Nick shook his head.

"What the hell is with that guy?"

"Who, Francis?" Louis asked as he walked up alongside Nick. "He's how he always is. You should see him take on a Tank."

"Should I?" He asked Louis.

Louis opened his mouth to say something, hesitated, then sighed and shook his head as they both turned to see Francis laughing loudly as he kicked the Charger body.

"Let's keep going." Bill said to the group. "We're almost at the bridge."

The evening had hit by the time they came close to the bridge. Ahead of them at the bridge was a wall of concrete on either side as well as across the top. The bridge itself was built connecting the town through a low hill, with the river on the other side. Above the concrete overpass were four towers standing only one story high, one in each corner corresponding with four cardinal directions. Beneath the towers were two large solid steel doors, clamped in place but still able to be retracted.

"Looks like the military went all out on this bridge." Bill said. "They must have relied on this to keep the infection from spreading to the Midwest."

"A lot of good it did them." Nick said.

"That's enough, Nick." Coach said. "There could be civilization on the other side of that bridge."

"How are we supposed to get through that?" Rochelle asked.

"There must be a control switch in the primary tower." Bill said. "We've got to get it open."

On the two closer towers were doors that led the survivors up a spiral staircase through the tower and up to the tower station up top.

As they approached the top, Bill looked over the consoles in each tower and then headed for the tower furthest North and looked over that console as well.

"We're going to have to wait for this machine to open the steel door to the bridge, but they'll be coming in from four different locations, not just here in the North Tower." Bill said. "Each tower has its own button to press so the door will open. We're going to have to split up, each of us guarding one of the cardinal directions. If any of these panels get smashed before or after the buttons are pressed, our chances of getting those metal doors open are shot."

"Sounds like a plan." Louis said.

"Good, we've got to split up in teams of two. I'll stay behind here."

"I'll stay too." Coach said.

"All right," Bill said. "So Francis, you and Ellis take the Western door and guard the bridge."

"Don't worry; we'll blow 'em up good." Ellis said with a look of confidence.

"Louis, you and Rochelle take the Southern Tower door, you're end might be the lightest of the Horde since they're massing up just east of us and the river's right there, but your going to have a good view of everything on the other side on land."

"I've got my Hunting Rifle." Rochelle said. "I'll try to reduce the numbers the best I can."

"I've got your back." Louis said.

"Nick, you and Zoey cover the Eastern door." Bill said.

"Great." Zoey said.

"All right people," Bill said. "Let's move out."

Louis walked south toward the tower with Rochelle close behind.

Ellis and Francis reached into their pockets and held out their explosives and shoguns.

Nick and Zoey walked down the hallway toward the eastern door and prepared for hell. Their tower was the closest to land as oppose to the bridge, and the first one to see the infected as they climbed up and into the tower.

"Eastern door has the worst of it." Zoey said. "Great…"

"Looks like you managed to get me alone in a room after all." Nick said.

Zoey loaded her auto shotgun.

"I hate you."

Nick paused. "Good to know."

"All right!" Bill shouted. "Hit the button!"

Zoey turned around toward the console behind them and hit the large red button on the console.

Just as the door clamps were released, nearby zombies began to climb in through the open windows, attracted to the loud squeaking of the mechanism gears. With pistols drawn, Zoey and Nick shot at all the zombies as they made their way into the eastern chamber.

As the zombies poured in, they surrounded the two in a matter of seconds. Armed with a shotgun and a pistol, Zoey sprayed the nearby walls with blown apart zombie pieces while Nick stood next to her firing off headshots at the nearest zombies.

"There's too many," Zoey said when she could get a word in over the screams of the horde. "We might not make it out of here!"

"Sounds like time to start talking about a Plan B!" Nick shouted.

The two finally cleared the nearest row around them when a dozen more filled the empty area even faster.

"Look, since we're not going to make it out of this after all!" Zoey said. "So why do you hate me so much, anyway?"

"Oh for Christ's sake, Zoey! We're gonna die and you're going to ask me that question _now_?"

"Well if we're not going to make it," Zoey stopped to cut the head off of a nearby zombie with a machete, "There's no point in holding off if we're going to die."

"Then I'll tell you in Hell!" Nick shouted.

The horde's violence increased as they continued to surround and claw at hem when suddenly Zoey was pulled to the ground. She let out a scream of pain and kept shooting panic fire at every infected she laid eyes on. The scream caused Nick to suddenly turn around and see Zoey incapacitated on the ground. His face then became a look of sheer rage.

He grabbed onto the machete Zoey had dropped and began to hack at the zombies surrounding her.

He reached down and helped Zoey to her feet as soon as he could.

"Try to actually keep yourself alive, okay?"

"Oh, shut up already! I'm going to die anyway, you said so yourself!" Zoey said as she shot the last closest infected nearby.

As she lowered her pistol, she saw another wave start to pour over the horizon. She stared in horror as she tried to catch her breath.

Nick quickly grabbed onto Zoey's arm as he also spotted the terror consuming the background.

"You really think I hate you?" He asked her.

Zoey turned around to face Nick, her face still horrified.

Nick quickly glanced over her head at the approaching horde, then back at Zoey. He stared at her for a second, almost debating the situation in his mind.

"?" Zoey asked calmly, concerned.

He went to say something but hesitated sighed as shook his head.

"God dammit." He whispered to himself. "I'm gonna regret this."

Suddenly he quickly pulled her close and kissed her.

"There, are you happy now?"

Zoey just stared at him; surprised at his unexpected advancement.

"Look, if we're going to die, might as well enjoy it!" He said.

"Well," Zoey said, her expression surprised and slightly disgusted. "I can honestly say I was NOT expecting that."

"Well that's what you get for asking! If we die then what the hell do you care?"

"You could have been a little more subtle about it!" She said as she reloaded her shotgun.

"Jesus Christ." Nick said as he covered his face with his hands. "What the fuck am I doing?"

"How about shooting some zombies, Casanova?"

She faced the door, and began to fire her shotgun and combat the horde even stronger than before.

"God damn, you can be such a bitch." Nick said as he once again opened fire.

Suddenly the screeching of the clamps below them had seized.

The survivors killed the last of the zombies in the area and began to make their way back to the North tower.

Nick and Zoey were silent with each other until Nick broke the silence just before entering the central tower.

"Hey, let's keep this between us, shall we?" He said.

"What, the sexual predator part, or the fact that you don't know how to kiss?"

"A what?" He said in disgust. "Are you ever easy to talk to?"

"If that really bothered you, we wouldn't be having this conversation."

"Hey, I thought we were going to die, it seemed like a good idea at the time."

"If you want to try to play the romantic hero so when this is all over you can get laid, try it on one of the zombies." She said coldly.

She quickly turned away from him and walked into the central tower, surrounding herself with the company of the other survivors.

Nick stood before the doorway, shook his head, and slowly followed.

The survivors went down the tower stairs and headed straight for the bridge, and hoped that the other side was more promising than what they left behind.


	10. This Is Not Happening

Standing in a safe room on the other side of the bridge, the survivors restocked on ammunition and prepared to continue their travels outward.

"The map says we just have to keep traveling along this road and we'll reach the military." Bill said.

"About time." Nick said. "I'm getting sick of seeing zombies everywhere again."

"Well you're just going to have to face reality and realize that we're in the goddamn apocalypse, Nick." Coach said.

"All right, let's go." Nick said.

"It might be a good idea to take a detour through this hospital just a little off the road." Bill said. "They've done evacs off of hospitals before."

"Ah, shit." Francis said. "I hate hospitals… why do we have go through another one?"

"Oh don't be so sad, Francis." Zoey said. "How many different patches of the woods have we been in?"

"I still hate the woods."

"Well I'm ready." Rochelle said.

"Yeah, let's do it." Francis said.

"Hey, did I ever time I told you about the time my buddy Keith camped out on top of a bridge with a six pack and a goat…"

"We ain't got time for this, Ellis." Coach said.

"Okay."

Louis reached forward and opened the safe room door.

"All right, let's do it!" He said as he stepped outside.

The survivors walked out of the safe room and began to make their way past the bridge and headed toward another city close by.

"Looks like the town entrance is in about six miles." Coach said as he looked around the grassy plain that surrounded them.

"Once we pass this mob of cars," Louis said, "We should be in the city limits in no time!"

The survivors looked over the street as there were more abandoned cars littering the street and shoulder alongside it. On either side was a plain of ruins and grass spread outward, all highlighting the distant buildings that stood out from the town that lay in front of them.

"From Baton Rouge to the middle of nowhere," Zoey said. "I hope the military stopped to camp out not too far from here."

"We can only hope." Coach said. "But I ain't givin' up."

"Looks like we've got to cross some more farm land if we want to get into town." Rochelle said.

"Well that can't be too bad." Louis said.

"Jeez, don't you ever get depressed, Mr. Sunshine?" Francis asked.

As they approached the town, they passed a few farm houses along the way. Many were either burned down or ruined beyond saving, while others were completely torn down.

They came upon one house that was still was intact. They decided to once again search it for supplies.

"The barn might have something." Coach said. "Why don't one of you young'uns go check it out?" He said.

"I'll check it." Zoey said.

"Oh, I'll go too. We might find some good stuff like a chainsaw or somethin' cool." Ellis said.

"All right, let's go." Nick said.

Zoey gave a look as Nick led the three of them toward the barn.

They slowly made their way toward the barn as they weaved through a trampled cornfield and came upon a tractor in the middle of it.

"Hey, a tractor!" Ellis said. He walked up to it and climbed up onto one of the large back wheels. He leaned casually against the side of the tractor as he fixed his hat.

"Hey Zoey," He said with a playful smile. "It'd be cool to take you out on a ride on one o' these things sometime."

"Uh…" Zoey said. "…No. Sorry, tractors aren't my thing."

"Could we get moving?" Nick said.

Ellis jumped down from atop the tractor wheel and continued to walk with the group.

"Oh, man. If I could, I'd love to ride that thing down to the river an' go fishin' or somethin'." Ellis said. "You think I could do that with you sometime?"

"Sure," Zoey said. "You can go wherever you want and do whatever you want there."

"You sure you want to give him that much freedom?" Nick said sarcastically.

"You're jealous." She snapped.

"Extremely." He said sarcastically.

"Fishing would be fun." She said to Ellis.

"That's awesome. We might have to wait until we cleared all the zombies though."

"Yeah, something like that…" Zoey trailed off as she headed toward the barn.

"Hey Nick," Ellis said as he walked up to him.

"What now, lover boy?" Nick said sarcastically as he rolled his eyes.

"Hey Nick, you think she thinks my tractor's sexy?"

"No, Ellis!" He snapped. "I don't think you know anything about women, okay? You don't know when to get a hint, and hers are pretty obvious, trust me."

"Well thanks for bein' honest, Nick." Ellis said. "I'll try to pick up on her hints a little more."

"Wow Ellis, you actually might learn something! Something you don't see every day." Nick said sarcastically as he walked away from Ellis and headed toward the barn.

The three approached the barn with caution. Inside it were only a few zombies lingering, and the rest was empty. The three began to search what remained of the interior.

"I knew it! A Chainsaw!" Ellis shouted. He turned on the engine and laughed.

"Those zombies are gonna be cut up before they know what hit 'em." He said as he turned it off.

The other two began to look around for items and supplies through the wrecked barn and assorted tools. Many farm tools and equipment had rusted, rendering them useless. The two continued to rummage through the different areas of the barn, moving aside broken rafters and dirt.

"I call dibs on the machete." Zoey said as she picked up a machete that was hidden beneath a knocked over wooden table nearby.

"I'll hold onto these pills." Nick said as he reached down past a small pile of broken wood panels.

Zoey continued to look through the barn when she spotted a gap between two boarded up panels. She gazed inside to see a stash of guns spread across a table top.

"Loot be mine." She said with a sly smirk. She shoved the edge of the machete between the two boards and began to push on the handle, attempting to pry the boards apart.

"What I'd do for a crowbar right now." She said as she continued to push on the handle.

Nick approached Zoey with a look of confusion.

"What the hell are you trying to do?"

She sighed in frustration with the lack of movement on the board.

"I'm trying to pry this damn thing off so I can get to the guns they boarded up on the other side." She said as she pulled the machete out to rest her arms.

He shook his head.

"Let me do it, you're too weak to pry that apart."

"I am not." She said; irritated. She quickly wrapped her hand back around the machete handle and began to push when her hand slipped off of the handle and slid across the sharp edge of the machete.

"Dammit!" She shouted as she quickly dropped the machete and brought her hand in close as she saw the blood start to seep out.

"Whoa, hey, you all right?" Nick said as he rushed up to her. He reached out to gently hold onto her hand for a better look when she shoved him back and stepped away from him, still cradling her wounded hand.

"I don't need help." She said as she held her hand tightly to stop the bleeding.

"You know what? Fine, I get it, all right? I'm gone. You obviously have everything under control, so I'll stay out of your way." He began to walk out of the barn and back toward the road.

"Good, you're worthless to me anyway." She muttered as she stared at her wounded hand.

He stopped in his tracks and looked over his shoulder at Zoey.

"Then stop following me." He said coldly.

"We should be gettin' back before too long now guys." Ellis said as he walked back toward them.

"Yeah, we shouldn't split up." Zoey said. She gave Nick a look.

"Let's get on goin'." Ellis said as he walked ahead of the two.

"You gonna be okay?" Nick asked Zoey.

She nodded, still clutching her hand.

"I'm fine, it's nothing." She said as she turned away.

"Hey, take it easy, will you?" He exclaimed. "You're bleeding all over the damn place, why don't you fix it up and let's go?" He reached toward her hand only to have her pull away from him.

"It's not worth wasting our first aid on just a cut."

"Hey, if you don't clean it up, it'll get infected and you'll die. Is that how you want to do this?"

He reached outward and grabbed her bleeding hand, holding it tightly in his grip as he reached for his first aid kit.

"Let's just get a bandage on it for now, okay?" He said.

"I don't need any help taking care of myself."

"But you never said you didn't want it." Nick said with a smile.

Suddenly Ellis stepped back into the doorway, anxious.

"Hey c'mon, y'all! They ain't gonna wait all day!"

Ellis left the barn, leaving Nick and Zoey standing silently, trying to ease the awkward tension. She looked back toward the wall at the machete.

"…Almost forgot my machete." She said softly.

"Then go get it." Nick said.

The three returned to the farmhouse while the others continued to search for supplies. Unfortunately they came up empty handed.

"Did you guy have any luck finding anything?" Louis asked when the three returned.

"I got myself a chainsaw, but that's all we got." Ellis said.

"This ain't gonna be an easy trip." Coach said.

"Looks like it's just straight into town from here." Bill said. "Let's keep movin', people!"

"All right, Bill! Keep your beard on." Francis said.

The group continued to make their way to the town when they came upon the sight of a pile of abandoned cars blocking the road entrance.

"Well there goes the road." Rochelle said.

"Through here." Francis said as he began to walk toward the building on the left side of the wreckage.

He kicked in a nearby window and climbed through it, landing in what appeared to be a hallway with dozens of rooms lining each side. As the others climbed through, they began to notice the doors had bars on them and large locks were secured over some. The rooms were safeguarded while one or two were padded. The walls and floor were

"Man, look at this place." Louis said as he stepped through.

"What the…" Nick said as he stepped through the window. "Is this place an asylum?"

"Great, now we're gonna get attacked by crazy zombies." Ellis said.

"Great, an asylum at the edge of town…" Zoey said. "What kind of people ran this place?"

The walls had claw marks and scratches made in blood along the floor. Dead bodies of staff members and patients scattered the blood-covered white tiling. Some of the doors were wide open or busted off the steel hinges; others were still sealed shut, unable to be opened without the proper key. A few zombies were scattered in the rooms, some in hospital uniforms, while others were in straightjackets, still clawing and struggling to break free.

"It looks like they tried restraining the infected patients." Louis said.

"Good, now they can't claw at us." Nick said.

One zombie in a straightjacket wandered in front of the group and stared at them evilly. He then leaned forward and charged head first toward Ellis, knocking him backwards into Coach.

"Whoa, easy there!" Coach said as he braced Ellis as he tumbled backward. "Them bastards are headstrong."

"They can't use it for much else." Nick said.

"Just shoot 'em in the head before they get too close." Francis said as he walked ahead of the group.

The survivors began looking over the rooms as they walked down the hall toward the front of the building. Nick glanced into a room that had been slightly undisturbed. On the wall was a picture of a farm house.

"Hey Ellis," Nick said. "Was this your room?"

"Ha ha, very funny, Nick." Ellis said.

A faint growl echoed through the hall toward them as they came to an intersection, the way toward the door was blocked by debris.

"I hear a Hunter." Francis said. "Come on out, wussy!"

Suddenly a scratchy growl was heard behind them.

"That's not a Hunter." Zoey said.

"Well there still is one." Francis said.

"Sounds like a…" Ellis paused as he turned around. "Smoker!" He shouted as the Smoker reached his tongue out to entangle Ellis and pull him close.

"Aah! Let me go!" He shouted as he was dragged.

Bill stepped forward and shot the Smoker until he exploded, freeing Ellis.

Ellis stood up, coughing through the Smoker's green cloud.

"Thank you, sir." He said as he walked back toward the group.

Suddenly the Hunter leapt and pinned Francis on the ground, tearing at his chest.

"Get it off!" Francis shouted as he attempted to push the creature off.

Louis shoved the Hunter off of Francis and fired upon it, until it screeched and died.

"Thanks, man." Francis said as he stood up.

"This is _not_ going to end well." Zoey said.

"Now you're startin' to sound like Nick." Coach said. "I ain't hearin' it in stereo."

Nearby the sudden sounds of a low gurgle accompanied with a raspy screeching sound were heard.

"We got to keep moving, guys." Louis said. "Let's try the left hallway. I've got a good feeling it'll take us to where we've got to go."

"I think he's onto somethin'." Ellis said. "The man's got a good sense o' stuff, I'm takin' his word for it."

"Why thank you, Ellis." Louis said.

"Fine, Mr. Sunshine." Francis said. "We'll go freakin' left."

The survivors went down the left corridor with caution. With the groans and screeches of special infected echoing through the once all white but now blood covered walls and floor, it kept everyone alert of a sudden ambush.

Suddenly Ellis froze and looked around nervously.

"I hear one of them back humpin' things again…"

Zoey looked at him. "A what?"

"Man it's wrong what they do to ya."

"What is it?" Louis asked.

Ellis shook his head. "It's horrible, man. It's a-"

"JOCKEY!" Rochelle shouted.

"Ah, shit!" Ellis said as he ducked.

Behind him the Jockey ran quickly around the corner and jumped over Ellis and latched onto Francis' back.

"GET THIS FUCKING CREEPY THING OFF!" Francis shouted.

Francis struggled and tried pulling the Jockey off of his head while the Jockey steered him down the hall and toward a horde of zombies that were staggering around the corner.

"GOD DAMMIT!" Francis shouted. "GET IT OFF!"

As the horde saw Francis and began to run for him, from behind the Jockey's head was sliced clean off and the body slumped off of Francis and onto the floor. Nick stood behind Francis with a bloody machete and tilted his head to one side and then the other, cracking his neck.

Francis just turned and looked at the decapitated body of the Jockey and back at Nick.

"You actually deal with these bastards?" He asked unbelievably.

"You get used to it." Nick said.

Suddenly the zombies spotted the two and began to run straight for them. From a nearby closet, out stepped a Boomer, ready to expel its bodily fluids.

"Oh, shit." Nick said.

"Hey, you guys okay?" Ellis said as he turned the corner. At that moment the Boomer leaned forward and spewed all over the three of them.

"Aw, man!" Ellis said.

"Shit!" Francis shouted. "Keep shootin'!"

"Go!" Nick shouted as they ran forward shooting at anything that moved toward them.

Zoey and Rochelle turned the corner and shot the horde as they swarmed the three. Zoey ran through the horde and shoved the Boomer further down the hall and shot it with her double pistols. The Boomer exploded as its lower half fell backward and spread out on the ground.

The bile dissipated and the zombies were soon all killed. As the blood and entrails slowly spread across the floor from the corpses, the five of them paused to catch their breath.

"Not bad, huh?" Nick said as he leaned against the wall.

"Could have been worse, if you ask me." Francis said. "I could have taken them all myself." He said as Rochelle walked up next to him.

"Thanks for the help." Ellis said as he looked at Zoey.

Zoey nodded. "No problem…" She paused, suddenly covering her nose with her sleeve. Next to her, Rochelle stared at Francis repulsively and covered her nose and mouth with her hand.

"What?" Nick said as he stared at them. "The hell's wrong with you guys?"

"I'm sorry." Rochelle said through her hand. "But…you guys smell really bad."

Zoey nodded in agreement as she walked away from Ellis and stood next to Nick against the wall.

Francis lifted up his right arm and sniffed himself. Ellis did the same.

"Aw, man." Ellis said. "It ain't us, it's the puke shit."

"It'll wear off." Francis said as he reloaded his shotgun.

"Hey, you guys all right?" Louis said as he, Bill, and Coach turned the corner. "We would have been here sooner but we got a little held up."

"One of them Spitters gave us a hell of a run around." Bill said.

"She coated the whole hall right behind you guys. We had to get out or we'd be burned to shit." Coach said.

"We also heard a Smoker, but never saw him." Louis said. "Keep your eyes open, they're both still out there."

"Heh, with a tongue like that," Nick said, "Him and the Spitter are probably somewhere making each other really happy." He smirked.

Zoey groaned as she covered her face with her hands and slowly began to laugh.

Nick began to laugh with her as Ellis finally caught on to the joke and began to laugh as well.

"That was a good one." He said.

"Hey, I don't wanna hear that shit." Coach said. He pointed at Nick. "Don't encourage him."

Zoey's eyes widened as she watched Coach walk away from Nick.

"Could have been worse," Zoey said. "Coach could have found a Cheeseburger the Boomer left behind when he blew up."

"Oh come on!" Nick said as he laughed.

"Oh that's just sick." Ellis said as he laughed too.

Coach turned around and gave the three a look.

"Hey, this one wasn't me this time, okay?" Nick said as he looked at Coach.

"Oh come on, Coach. It was all in good fun, we didn't mean any harm by it." Ellis explained.

Coach turned away and began to walk down the hall.

"All right, enough horseshit." Bill said. "Let's keep moving."

All was silent for a minute or so between the survivors.

"Jeez, I didn't mean to upset Coach." Zoey whispered to Ellis. "He must be mad that I insulted his cheeseburger."

Ellis snickered. "Must've made fun of his pride an' joy."

"Yeah he's had some fond memories with a cheeseburger." Nick added. "Whispering Oaks, the Tunnel of Love…"

"He probably bought it a ticket to the Midnight Riders." Ellis joked.

"The Midnight Riders?" Zoey questioned apprehensively.

"You never heard o' the Midnight Riders?" Ellis asked in surprise.

"No, are they any good?" She asked.

"No." Nick said.

"Shit, the Midnight Riders are the best!" Ellis said.

"You guys talkin' about the Midnight Riders?" Francis asked. "I know those guys."

"You _know_ them?" Ellis asked in excitement. "Oh, that is awesome!"

"Yeah, I was a member of their road crew for a while. Then they made a hit love song and I couldn't stand them anymore."

"Ever been to one of their shows?" Coach asked Francis.

"Hell yeah, best way to burn incriminating evidence." He replied with a smug smirk.

"I should try that sometime." Nick said.

"Hey guys, hold up a sec." Louis said. "You hear that?" Everyone stopped moving and paused.

"I think I hear something growling, or grunting." Louis said quietly.

"We'll know soon enough." Rochelle said.

"You know what would be the worst thing to have happen right now?" Ellis said. "A Tank."

Just then Bill stepped around the corner of the hallway, and roaring from inside a closet charged a Tank straight for the group.

"Fall back!" Bill shouted as he backed away.

"TANK!" Coach shouted as he followed Bill.

"Shoot it, shoot it!" Ellis shouted.

"Come on!" Francis said as he pulled up his shotgun. "Come here and meet your maker!"

"Are you fucking crazy?" Nick shouted at him. "You're gonna try to take this thing on by yourself?"

Francis began to shoot the Tank as fast as he could fire his auto shotgun.

"Well I know you're afraid of messing up your fancy suit!" Francis snapped as he reloaded.

"What the hell are you doing, Francis?" Bill shouted.

"Light him up!" Zoey shouted as she threw a Molotov at it.

The burning only made the Tank angrier as it now decided to head straight for Zoey. As it charged down the narrow hall toward Zoey, all the survivors rand back through the hall as fast as they could.

As they turned the corner of the hall, a Spitter stood on the other side of the hallway and spat onto the ground before them, trapping them in the hallway with the Tank.

"Oh God," Zoey said.

"SHOOT IT!" Louis shouted.

All the survivors shot as fast as they could at the Tank, slowly backing up but trying to avoid the acid behind them.

Francis continued to shoot the Tank in the face while the others still shot at the flaming mass before them.

Finally, the Tank collapsed in front of them, and the acid dissipated. With the rest of their energy, the survivors ran to the end of the hall and into the safe room.

"Come on!" Louis shouted from the safe room. "Everybody inside!"

They piled in as Zoey shut the door behind them.

"And _that_ is how you do it!" Nick said triumphantly.

Once again, the survivors were safe from the infection and the zombies that roamed the asylum, but only for a time.


	11. Better Safe Than Sorry

11. Better Safe than Sorry…

"So what the hell's with all the zombies being tied up?" Francis asked.

"They were probably thought to have been going crazy due to their mental illness as oppose to the infection." Louis replied. "I'm sure some of it was required…"

"Yeah, whatever." Francis interrupted. "Lead on."

The two then suddenly turned toward the sound of Bill popping his shoulder.

"That bastard must've taken a pretty good swing at me."

"Bill, you should heal up." Louis said.

"I'll be fine." Bill said. "Just take some pills and it'll be fine."

"Well just be careful." Rochelle said. "We all gotta be careful with supplies, and to make sure we don't hurt ourselves too much."

"With my luck," Zoey said. "I'd pull something while trying to jump off an edge and landing in some kind of awesome spy pose."

"And accomplish nothing whatsoever by it." Nick commented.

"Yeah you would." Ellis said. "You could be like an assassin or somethin' cool!"

"Want a ninja sword to go with that?" Nick offered sarcastically.

"No thanks." Zoey said. "I'm pretty happy with my pistols."

Coach and Louis stood in the safe room doorway as they swung it open and began to shoot at the zombies littering the halls and nearby doorways.

From a nearby room, another zombie in a straightjacket stumbled into view. It stared at the survivors and gritted its teeth.

"Watch out," Louis said. "We've got another zombie in a straightjacket."

The zombie grew angry with the survivors, and while struggling to free its arms became more annoyed with itself, and finally charged head first straight for the survivors.

"Watch your ass!" Francis shouted as he dodged.

The rest of the group stepped aside and shot the zombie as he charged for the group.

"Better be careful they never get ya," Bill said. "They could push us all aside at the worst possible time."

"Like when a Tank comes?" Ellis asked.

"Ellis!" Nick snapped. "No more talking about Tanks, all right?"

"Okay."

The group continued down the blood-covered halls and broken apart rooms when they came to the end of the hall where they met another hallway with a path leading left and right. Where the one hall ended in front of them was a building plan as well as key building locations on paper stuck to the wall.

"Here," Louis said as he pointed to one section. "Here's the front door, if we can get to it or a nearby window, we should be all right."

"It looks like our only hall's sealed off." Coach said. "That should have been the way out." He said as he pointed to their right. At the end of the right branch of the hallway was a large pile of rubble and ruined pieces of the walls crumbled into an impassible barricade.

"We can still go left." Louis said. "This way seems like it could work. We might end up going upstairs if it takes us over this blockage."

"More goddamn stairs…" Coach said. "And I thought I'd never get a chance to work this shit off."

"Don't worry, Coach." Zoey said. "Just think, maybe someone hid a Twinkie in their desk drawer upstairs."

Coach made a face as he glared at Zoey's disrespect.

"Relax, fat man." Francis said. "We'll probably pass some sort of beat to shit kitchen or something…at least you'll get to look at it." He smirked.

"I don't think I'm liking your tone." Coach said.

"Just when you thought you were used to me." Nick said.

"Hey man, I'm a realist." Francis said. "We're all gonna die anyway."

"See? And no one ever listens."

"All right, that's enough you guys." Louis said. "We've got to get upstairs now, we've been in one place for too long."

"What'll it do to us?" Francis said sarcastically.

Suddenly a Smoker's scream was heard and a Smoker's tongue shot toward the group and pulled Nick backward.

"What the- … get HIM, not ME!" He shouted as he was dragged by the Smoker away from the group toward him in front of the safe room behind them.

Francis just turned and smirked. "See? Didn't happen to me!"

"Oh that is _not _how you should be handling this." Louis snapped as he raised his assault rifle and fired upon the Smoker.

"What? It _wasn't_ me." Francis said.

The Smoker exploded into its usual green cloud as Nick quickly stood up and walked away from the nauseous cloud.

Nick gave Francis a glare as he walked back toward the group.

Suddenly a Hunter screeched and leapt onto Francis.

"Ah, shit! Get it off!" He shouted.

Nick pulled out his Magnum and shot the Hunter once in the back of the head. It shrieked in pain and its body slid off of Francis as he stood up.

Francis stood up and gave Nick a quick look, then grabbed his shotgun.

"What, no 'thank you'?" Nick said.

"All right, that's _enough_." Louis said. "We're bound to get on each other's nerves sooner or later, but we need to stick together to all get out of here alive. If you're mean to each other now, you'll be sorry when one of you ends up dead."

"We have to keep going." Bill said. "Unless you'd like more incidents like this to happen, I suggest we get a move on, people."

"Thanks, Bill." Louis said. "Leftward, people." He said as he began to head down the left hallway.

Suddenly another loud groan was heard echoing down the halls nearby.

"I ain't stayin' put." Ellis said as he walked up right behind Louis.

Rochelle, Coach, and Bill all followed as Zoey looked at Francis and Nick who seemed to be frozen in their irritation.

"Look, why don't you two just stop it and try to help us all survive, okay?" Zoey said to the two. "You don't have to be rude to each other."

"So you're on _his_ side?" Nick snapped.

"I'm not on anyone's side." She said as she looked at Nick. She looked at Francis. "You could have said thank you, though. You guys could _try_ to be nice."

"Jesus, Zoey. I ain't sayin' shit just because your boyfriend's got his panties in a bunch." Francis said. He rested his shotgun over his right shoulder.

Zoey glared at Francis, and then looked away; annoyed with his lack of cooperation.

"You could at least try, for me?" She said to Francis.

"Its fine, he doesn't have to say anything." Nick said, annoyed. "Let's just keep going."

The group walked up the flight of stairs at the end of the hall on the left and began to explore the upper floor. As they began to follow the hallway toward the direction of the front door, Ellis glanced out the window and saw the dark clouds the still lingered across the sky. In the distance, lightning flashed and caused Ellis to blink. As he continued to stare, a muffled sound of thunder was heard through the window soon after.

"That storm's gettin' louder." He said as he caught up to the group.

"Then we better move fast." Bill said.

As they continued to work their way through the halls and straggling zombies, in the distance a low gurgling groan seemed to be following them.

"Fat bastard…" Nick muttered.

Nearby the sound of a Charger voice was heard grumbling in the shadows.

As Bill and Louis led the group toward a hallway that had stairs leading to the first floor when suddenly a Charger ran up the stairs and gunned straight for the middle of the group.

"Charger!" Bill shouted.

"Hey, watch out!" Ellis shouted.

One by one they all dodged, except for Zoey who was at the far end of the group.

She saw the Charger run for her and gasped. In a panic, she froze in place, unable to dodge the danger.

"Charger's gonna grab Zoey!" Coach shouted.

"Shoot it!" Nick shouted as he began to fire his shotgun toward the Charger. Next to him, Francis, Ellis, and Louis also opened fire on the Charger as it reached out and grabbed a hold of Zoey.

"AAHH!" She screamed as she was pounded into the ground by the Charger's mutated arm.

The group continued to fire on the Charger until shortly after it was dead.

Zoey slowly began to stand up and limped toward the group.

"You okay, Zoey?" Louis asked.

"Yeah, I'll be fine." Zoey said. "Just a little banged up."

"You'll be fine." Bill said.

"Bill, you're still injured from the Tank a while back." Louis said. "Why don't you patch yourself up?"

"I'm not dead yet." Bill said.

Just then the echoing groans of the Boomer grew louder as the Boomer gurgled and ran up the stairs and threw up on Bill and Ellis.

"Agh, Christ!" Bill shouted.

"That is _not_ good." Rochelle said.

As the zombies poured from the nearby rooms and bathrooms, the survivors shot at the horde as fast as they could.

At the top of the stairs, Bill continued to shoot the horde until one quick swipe knocked him down and into the chaos.

"Shit!" Coach shouted as he saw Bill go down. He ran up to the horde and shoved them down the stairs as he made his way to Bill.

"Come on, we may be old but we ain't frail yet!" He said as he helped Bill up.

"Thanks for that." Bill said.

As the horde died down, the group went down the stairs as Bill and Zoey limped behind the group.

Outside, the thunder grew rapidly louder with every passing flash.

"That storm is just about to hit." Louis said. "We'd better get out of here and to a safe house before we get caught in a hell of a downpour."

"Aw, man. We've been through'a rainstorm before back in a sugar mill. Man, I never seen so many witches wanderin' around the same place before and they were all cryin' an'shit 'cause they all came to the smell o'the sugar, and y'know how that stuff smells…"

"Ellis, can we chat about this later?" Zoey said as she limped down the stairs.

"Okay." He said.

Suddenly the survivors heard one more roll of thunder and watched as the rain began to pour down hard onto the open road before them.

"Shit!" Nick said.

"We gotta move fast!" Bill said.

"Look!" Louis said as he pointed down the right hallway. "That looks like the front desk to me!"

"About damn time." Coach said.

"Come on, guys!" Louis said.

The group continued to make their way down the hallway when suddenly Bill froze in place.

"Quiet!" He whispered loudly. He paused, listening to a familiar sound. "I hear a Witch."

"Ah hell…" Ellis said. "See that, man? They're everywhere!"

"Where is she?" Zoey asked.

"She's close," Bill said. "Be careful when searching these rooms for supplies." He shifted his stance and seemed to wince in pain.

"Hey Bill, you all right?" Louis asked.

"I'll be fine." Bill said. "But if I go down, you can go on without me."

"No," Rochelle said. "We're not leaving anyone behind."

Francis continued to scan for supplies and ammo in nearby hospital rooms when he walked into one and found himself face to face with a horrible sight.

Before him the Witch was sitting with her back to him and began to groan as she looked over her left shoulder and stared at him with her bright red eyes. She began to rise up and extend her claws as Francis stood staring at her as she grew angrier and began to groan even louder in her increasing fear and rage.

"WITCH!" He shouted as she stood up completely.

He quickly turned around and ran as she turned to face him. He fired off a single shotgun shot at her as she screamed and ran straight for him.

"Francis!" Zoey shouted as she heard the Witch scream as she ran for Francis, shoving Ellis and Coach out of the way.

"SHIT!" He shouted as he kept running for the front desk.

Nick and Ellis kept firing upon the Witch and chased her down as she followed Francis with her claws extended and screaming.

Unfortunately for Francis, the Witch had caught up to him and swiped him across the back, scratching him and knocking him down. She raised her hands to swipe and claw at Francis again when she suddenly shrieked in pain and fell to her death.

As Francis looked up at the Witch as she fell onto the ground next to him to see Nick with his shotgun still aimed at where the Witch once stood. Smoke was still rising from the barrel.

Nick lowered his shotgun and walked up to Francis and extended his hand.

Francis reached up and grabbed onto Nick's hand and Nick helped pull him up.

"That's twice now." He said. "We're gonna need a guy like you a little longer, so quit playin' around with the nearest bitch you can get your hands on." He said.

Francis gave him a look, and then nodded.

"…Thanks."

"Guys," Zoey shouted as she looked through the broken window of the front door. "That storm is _not_ letting up."

"We better do some scavengin' then." Ellis said. "Grab what ya can!"

The group spread out through the various nearby rooms as Louis, Bill, and Nick searched by the front desk.

"Ammo here!" Bill shouted as he found an ammo pile on the top of the desk.

Louis began to open nearby cabinets and looked over what was left of their contents.

"Grabbin' Pills." He said as he grabbed one of the remaining bottles.

Nick grabbed onto a metal drawer handle and gave it a pull. The drawer did not budge, and Nick noticed a large metal keyhole kept the drawer locked from anyone but the staff from gaining access.

He got a tighter grip on the drawer handle and gave it a yank, but the drawer still didn't budge. Finally in his frustration, he reached toward his holster for his Magnum and shot the lock. The sound of clashing piercing metal made Louis and Bill stare at Nick.

The drawer slowly rolled open with the lock blown off to reveal a drawer full of emergency syringes.

"Adrenaline shots here." He said as he grabbed one of the syringes.

"I'm not finding any First Aid here, guys." Zoey shouted from one of the rooms.

"Ah, shit." Bill mumbled to himself.

Suddenly a flash of lightning accompanied by a loud clash of thunder flashed right in front of them.

"We better hurry." Louis said to Bill and Nick.

"Let's move out, people!" Bill shouted.

"Come on, we don't have all day." Nick called out.

Suddenly a horde began to gather outside of the door and began to destroy it.

"What's happening?" Zoey asked.

"The thunder must be attracting them." Louis said.

"Yeah, and it's going to get ugly from here on out." Nick said.

"Well boys," Zoey said as she grabbed ammo and reloaded her shotgun. "Lock 'n' load."

"Hell yeah!" Ellis shouted. "Here, chew on this!" He said as he reached into his back pocket. "Pipe bomb out!" He shouted as he threw a pipe bomb through the hole in the door and into the middle of the horde.

The pipe bomb went off and blew up the horde, leaving nothing but a few unrecognizable parts behind.

Suddenly lightning flashed brightly through the open doors and thunder was heard echoing off of the nearby buildings shortly after.

"This storm's not letting up anytime soon." Bill said. "It's either now or never."

"Time to nut up or shut up." Ellis said with a toothy grin.

"Well let's do it!" Louis said as he ran out the door and into the rain.

"Come on!" He shouted at the rest of the survivors. "We don't have a lot of time!"

The rest of the survivors followed Louis out into the pouring rain.

The storm clouds had severely darkened the sky and the pouring rain grayed and clouded the street around them. All buildings and cars were just dark objects in a mass of blurred mist.

"All right, now let's all move at once, so we don't get lost." Coach announced.

"Stick together!" Francis said.

"Don't nobody wander off now!" Ellis said.

Rochelle was the farthest behind the group, trying very hard to keep up with them through the cold, hard rain. Suddenly she heard a strange sound behind her and turned around quickly, attempting to avoid the element of surprise. She scanned the area as far as she could see; tracing over the blurred shapes of the abandoned cars and fencing blocking off the other direction of the road. From behind she heard a voice that sounded far away but very similar to Bill's. When she heard the voice she turned around to face the road, only to find that the other survivors were nowhere to be found on the road ahead.

"Guys?" She shouted over the pouring rain. No answer.

From the cold water and the feeling of abandonment, she began to shiver.

"…Oh no." She said. "No, this is not happening." She said as she began to slowly walk down the street, hoping that the blurs ahead of her were signs of her friends, only to find she had been focusing on abandoned cars or street lights. She heard what she thought to be voices echoing off of the buildings and continued to follow them. When she came to an area where an alley nearby was cleared of zombies, she heard the voices echoing again, but was unsure whether they came from the open road or from the alley. She kept her SMG held up and gripped tightly onto it as she cautiously chose the darker alley way to explore, still looking for her friends.

"…Guys? Anyone?" She shouted. Still she heard no answer.

"Hey!" She shouted loudly. She began to shake with fear as she looked in every possible direction for any sign of a familiar face. Every place she looked came up empty, and with every attempt to spot them nearby, she only further scared herself into utter panic.

The sky began to darken above her as all she could see were black clouds blanketing the sky above her. The lack of sunlight left the town's atmosphere to seem bleak; grey and darkened by the weather. The buildings seemed to have been washed out of all recognizable structures and distinctiveness with the constant rushing water continuously beating down on her. Shivers continued to work their way up her spine as she heard a noise from one corner of the alley echo off of the buildings and gave the area an eerie feeling. She attempted to use her flashlight to help light her way, but the rain was pouring so quickly that the flashlight did not illuminate the path ahead of her, but instead reflected back at her, making it harder for her to see. From behind her, she heard a voice and stopped, turning slightly to see if it was someone she knew. The sound had stopped. She turned back toward the direction she was heading when she heard the sounds behind her once again. This time, they were louder. As she continued to move forward, the sounds became increasingly louder with every step.

Suddenly, she stopped moving, trying to listen to the sound better, still shaking with panic, afraid to keep moving, afraid to stand still, and even more afraid to turn around. As she stood still, the sound was gone. This only increased her panic, as she began to frantically search in front of her for any sign of refuge or humanity. She stared at her SMG, which was shaking profusely as she tightened her grip.

She heard another loud noise behind her which made her jump, causing her to begin to run down the alley as fast as she could; her heart beating quickly and pounding in her chest. Behind her, the growling and unknown noise became even louder with every step. As she continued to run with all of her might, the alley seemed to be getting longer and the street on the other end seemed farther and farther away. Tears began to flow down her face but were quickly washed away by the pounding rain. Suddenly she lost her footing and fell forward onto the pavement. She heard a loud noise behind her and began to scramble to stand up, slipping on the street as she frantically reached for her gun that had slid away from her.

Suddenly she was grabbed from behind and pulled away from the street and under a nearby porch. She screamed in fear as she attempted to fight, but didn't have the strength. She turned to look behind her and found out that it was Coach that had pulled her out of the rain.

"Coach!" She shouted as she gave him a big hug. "Thank you…" She said, her voice shaking.

Suddenly from the alley a Hunter quickly crawled in front of them and leapt at the two, causing Rochelle to jump and shriek in a panic. Coach quickly pulled out his shotgun and fired, killing the Hunter instantly.

"You okay?" He asked her.

She looked up at him, tears streaming down her face as she continued to shake. Slowly, she nodded.

"I didn't know where anybody was, I couldn't find…"

"Don't worry, it didn't take long for us to find out you got lost, we've been looking all over for you! Now let's get to that Safe Room."

Coach walked down the alley and onto the street with Rochelle holding tightly onto his arm. She saw a light in one of the buildings on the right side of the road, with Louis standing outside it in the rain.

"Hey!" Louis shouted as he waved at the two. "We're back here!"

Coach waved back. "I found her!"

Just then Ellis came running from another nearby alley in response to Coach's finding. He walked up near the safe room and stood by Louis.

"Come on now!" Ellis shouted. "It's just a little bit down the road here! Y'all gonna make it?"

"Into the safe room, people!" Bill shouted as he stepped outside.

"Jesus Christ…" Bill said when he saw her.

"All right, let's get inside and close the goddamn door!" Francis shouted as he stood in the doorway.

Louis came in behind them and shut the safe room door.

"BOOM-Diah!" He said with a smile.

Zoey laughed as she walked up to Rochelle and Coach.

"Are you okay?" She asked Rochelle.

Rochelle nodded and smiled faintly. "I'm just really shaken up, that's all."

"Here," Nick said as he walked up to Rochelle with First Aid.

"Now don't waste this by getting pounced on or something." He said as he bandaged her up.

Francis glanced over at Bill, who seemed to be in similar pain.

"Bill, man, heal up." He said.

"I'm doing fine, Francis." Bill replied.

Francis shook his head and picked up First Aid and walked up to Bill.

"Quit fussin' and let me heal ya." He commanded as he patched up Bill.

"That wasn't necessary, but thanks." Bill said.

"I told ya I'd take care of ya." Francis replied.

Louis walked up to Rochelle and gently put a hand on her shoulder. "You gonna be okay?"

Rochelle nodded. "I'm just really cold and tired right now. I should be fine by tomorrow. I can take this." She said with a smile.

Louis smiled. "All right then, you stay strong. And when you don't have any strength left, we'll stay strong for you."


	12. Francis! What The Hell is Wrong With You

12.

Francis! What The Hell is Wrong With You?!

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Francis snapped. "How the hell am I wrong?"

"It ain't worth it, man!" Ellis said. "I don't know how you think that Angelina Jolie is somethin' worth thinkin' about. I mean, it ain't worth it, she ain't cute."

"Bullshit. With an ass like that,"

"That's _enough_ of that, Francis." Louis said.

"Oh come on, Louie, anyone _you'd_ bang if you had the chance?"

"I don't see how you guys could sit here and talk of such disgusting things, even in front of the girls."

"Eh, they don't care." Francis smirked.

"There's gotta be some lady you been thinkin' of sometime o' another." Ellis smirked.

"I always thought that the actress Sandra Bullock was quite a sweetheart."

"So you'd bang her, huh?"

"I did not say _anything_ like that." Said Louis, annoyed.

"But you were thinkin' it." Francis said with an annoying smirk.

Louis rolled his eyes and refused to reply.

Ellis sat on the floor where he had been previously as Francis sat on the couch across from him. Behind Francis sat Louis, Coach, and Bill on a table nearby. Coach and Bill were deep in their own conversation while behind Ellis Rochelle leaned against the wall next to a table that Zoey was lounging on and propped her back against the wall. In her hand she had a half empty bottle of cola she was slowly emptying. On the adjacent wall, positioned next to Ellis and Francis was another table that Nick sat upon, observing the outrageous conversation.

"I still think Ms. Jolie is just overrated. She's probably mostly made of that plastic input shit anyhow."

"Well who would you want from before the apocalypse?"

Ellis smiled sheepishly "Well, I kinda always thought that the singer Taylor Swift was kinda pretty."

"What the hell does she got? She's not a piece worth time. Now if there's one that is worth hunting down that will even screw you in the freakin' men's room, that's somethin' worth braggin' about."

"Some good memories." Nick smirked.

"Hell yeah!" Francis said as he nodded to Nick. "See that? That's the kind of shit that makes you a real man. Understand, kid?"

Ellis chuckled. "That ain't right, man!"

"All right, that's enough from the both of you." Louis said. "You guys have no right to plague his young mind with your smut. Take it somewhere else, will you?"

"I would, but Angelina Jolie's not here to take it to, now is she?" Francis laughed.

"Jesus, aren't you outspoken…" Nick muttered.

"It's real disrespectful, anyhow." Ellis said. "But I'm not really serious 'bout it." He looked at Francis with an enthusiastic smirk. "So who else you think would be worth takin' a shot at before the apocalypse, huh?"

"Well _duh_ before the apocalypse! All the hot girls are dead!" Francis replied.

Rochelle's jaw dropped.

"Do we really have to sit here and listen to this shit? They are downright insulting us right here to our faces!"

Zoey just gulped down more of her cola. "You just get used to it after a while. Ignore it." She shrugged. "When desperate times call for desperate measures, keep your gun on hand and if any of them get desperate enough to try to come after you, shoot his balls off."

"I just might have to." Rochelle said to herself.

"Y'know who else is hot? I don't mean hot like cute, but smokin' hot, that girl Zoe Saldana! She's got some nice curves on her, yessir."

"Yeah," Francis said with a devious smile. "I could see that. Hell, I could see that for a long ass time."

The three laughed.

"What about that girl Megan Fox, she's one worth coming back to again and again." Nick smirked.

"Ugh," Zoey said. "Isn't she like, half your age?"

"Since when does age matter?" Nick asked.

"No way it matters." Francis said.

"Just as long as her daddy's not around to catch ya in the act!" Ellis said. "Y'all get into some serious trouble if yer caught, especially by her daddy."

"Well that depends on if you're her daddy or not." Nick said slyly.

Rochelle moaned in disgust. "Oh, that was _not_ right."

"What, you girls don't get into that kind of stuff?"

Zoey choked on her swig of cola.

"_No_, we don't!" She snapped. "That's sick." She coughed.

"I don't think Megan Fox would think so!" Ellis began to laugh. Francis laughed along with him.

"You know who else would be hot?" Nick said. "Amy Lee. Something about her I'd like to get to know a little better."

"What do you think you'll find out about her?" Ellis asked.

"I'd love to know how deep her personality goes."

"Ew," Rochelle said. "I _cannot_ listen to this anymore!"

"I just said I wanted to know who she was!" Nick said.

"She's ugly." Francis commented.

"The lead singer from Evanescence?" Zoey asked.

"Yeah." Nick replied.

"She is pretty…" Zoey said.

"Is that who that is? I know who y'all are sayin' now. I seen her, she's got some crazy long hair, man."

"I think it looks nice." Zoey said.

"Some of the stuff she wears is pretty hot." Nick said.

"I always loved her style." Zoey said.

"Really?" Nick said.

"Yeah," Zoey said. "She always managed to pull off the most outrageous things."

"Not that outrageous." Rochelle corrected. "Ever see Lady Gaga?"

"Is that even human?" Nick asked.

"I heard she was really a man. Which is just plain wrong if ya ask me." Ellis said.

"She's too creepy even for me." Francis said. "I only take girls with something to show off."

"Could we _please_ talk about something else?" Rochelle begged. "It's getting late and we need to get some sleep real soon."

Zoey shivered. "Yeah, and I think it's gonna be a cold one."

"You gonna be all right, Zoey?" Louis asked.

"Unless everyone else is as cold as I am, I'll manage."

"Well I'm feeling all right, but if you do get cold…"

"Thanks Louis, but I'll manage." Zoey smiled at him.

"Lights out, people!" Bill shouted.

The eight found a separate section of the floor and attempted to fall asleep through the sound of the pouring rain and thunder.

Rochelle sat up, shivering. She looked toward one corner and saw Zoey freezing as well.

"Hey, you a little cold?" Louis asked as he sat up next to him.

Rochelle nodded.

"Come on, you should keep warm." Louis said as he brought her closer to him. "We all are going to make it, I just know it."

Zoey was huddled in a corner of the room, shivering. Just as she was about to finally drift off to sleep, her body shook her awake from the cold air blowing in from under the safe room door. She looked at the rest of the survivors as they slept, unaware of her freezing.

She slowly put her head back down on her arm as she used it as a pillow and stayed huddled together to keep warm.

As the cold night slowly progressed, Nick awoke and slowly sat up. He rubbed his face with his hands as he sat staring at the ceiling.

He looked at the group as they were scattered across the room and saw Zoey huddled in the corner, visibly shivering. He stared at her as she continued to shake herself awake and was unable to keep herself warm. He slowly stood up and quietly walked toward her as she continued to shiver in the corner.

He laid down next to her and stared at her as she shivered. He looked away at the rest of the group and shook his head.

"I'm gonna regret this…" He whispered to himself.

He then slowly moved closer to Zoey and wrapped his arms around her, hoping it would keep her warm.

The movement caused Zoey to slowly wake up. She looked at Nick's arms around her; half asleep, and without hesitation, set her head back down and fell back asleep.

The next morning the light shined in and woke up Nick. He looked around the room to find himself lying on his back, with Zoey snuggled up to him, sleeping peacefully with her head on his chest. Her arm was wrapped around him as she slept comfortably.

He stared at her as she slept and was no longer shivering. He laid his head back onto the concrete, faintly smiling.


	13. You See That? We're Almost Out Of Here!

Zoey slowly awoke and breathed in the fresh air as she kept her eyes closed. She shifted slightly to get a little more comfortable. Suddenly she realized what she had been laying on and her eyes sprung open. She looked at Nick, who seemed to have fallen back asleep. She quickly looked at the other survivors, seeing if any of them had noticed. Seeing the coast was clear, she sat up quickly and rubbed her eyes.

Still lying on the floor, Nick opened his eyes and watched Zoey as she sat up and rubbed her face.

She sighed as she looked at the small ray of sunlight peeking through the slit in the safe room door. A slight chill caused her to shiver quickly, but briefly. As she held onto her arms to keep warm, she recalled how cold it had been the night before, and tried to recall how she managed to keep warm. She suddenly looked over her right shoulder at Nick, who still lay on the floor with his eyes closed, as if he hadn't been disturbed by her movement.

She looked upon how peaceful he seemed and smiled. He began to open his eyes and she quickly turned away, looking toward the safe room door.

As sunlight began to fill the room, the other survivors began to wake up and prepare for their journey.

Louis sat up and yawned as he stretched. Next to him, Rochelle slowly opened her eyes.

"This is it, guys." Louis said. "Everyone wake up, today's the day!"

"I almost forgot." Zoey said. "We've been moving for so long, it seemed like we were never getting anywhere."

"Well worry no more, we are very close to finally reaching that rendezvous point that the military said for us to meet them!"

"About friggin' time…" Francis groaned as he slowly got up.

Louis stood up and stretched his arms upward and outward, then tilted his head side to side to relax his neck muscles. He walked up to the gun and ammo table and picked up his Sub-Machine Gun and a pipe bomb. He loaded the SMG with ammo and grabbed two pistols for the ride. He stopped to see that he had been the only one that was awake and preparing.

"Well come on, let's go guys! We don't have all day!"

"How the hell can you be so peppy this early in the morning, Mr. Sunshine?" Francis grumbled. "Even my ass is still asleep."

Louis smirked. "You've never been a morning person."

Bill stood up from the corner he had slept in and walked over toward the gun table.

"Louis is right, we'd better get a move on." He said.

He grabbed the M-16 Assault Rifle and loaded it with ammunition and grabbed a bottle of pills along with two pistols.

"This is going to be a hell of a bumpy ride if we don't move fast." He said.

Louis nodded. "The sooner we leave the more daylight we'll have, and hopefully find them by early evening. This is it, guys! We're finally going to make it!"

"Huh, what?" Ellis said as he was startled awake. He stretched his arms up and scratched his side.

"Anyone else have a dream about arm wrestling a Tank…?"

"This is going to be a very long trip…" Nick said.

Zoey turned around to see Nick sitting up against the wall, fully awake.

"If we leave now, we'll make it in time to have the military fill us in on a _lot_ of unanswered questions." Louis said.

"And maybe some snacks…" Coach yawned.

"Well everyone grab some supplies and get ready, we got a long journey ahead of us." Bill said.

Bill, Coach, and Louis left the safe room and began to make their way outside as Ellis, Rochelle, and Francis followed.

Zoey stood debating between a pipe bomb and a Molotov while Nick began to load his AK-47.

"Just when I thought getting rescued was never going to happen." Zoey said. "Now it looks like we'll finally be out of this, this…"

"Deepest circle of hell…?" Nick said.

Zoey nodded in agreement. "I'll take that." She said sarcastically.

"The sooner the better, then I can actually enjoy myself again." He said.

"So when we do get rescued, you'll be back at the bar and hitting on girls?" She asked.

"I don't even care what I'm gonna do, just as long as I'm out of this zombie hell." He said.

"Yeah, it gets old fast."

"No more of this close quarter shit. We can get a chance to actually be alone."

Zoey shrugged. "Well I didn't mind being this close to you, or anyone. It's good to know you can trust people sometimes."

"Does that mean that if I offered to buy you a drink when this is all over that you'd actually join me?" He paused, watching her for a sudden change in expression. "Or are you just going to tell me no like every other time?"

She stared at him, slightly annoyed, but suddenly she gave him a look of content and smiled.

"A drink would be nice." She said finally. "I'll tell you what, after this apocalypse is over, you owe me one."

"Wow, no sarcastic phrase? I'm impressed. Why the sudden change of heart?"

"Well I don't always have to have a sarcastic answer," She smiled. "I can be nice when I want to be."

"Well that's good; we might actually learn to get along with each other."

She stared at him. "…Yeah." She looked at him. "I could do that."

They smiled at each other.

"Then I don't have to listen to you bitch at me all the time." He chuckled as he loaded his assault rifle and left the room.

Zoey stood watching Nick as he left the room with a look of uneasiness, as if she had taken what was said to heart. She shook her head for a second, and then her eyes looked up with realization.

"…Oh God…" She said sadly as she shook her head.

Outside the survivors continued to make their way through Louisiana heading northwest following the road before them. As they continued on, more and more infected were swarming, more than usual.

"Is it just me," Rochelle said. "Or are these groups getting larger?"

"I think somethin' bad happened on this road, man, I mean think about it, we been seein' a lot of zombies all of a sudden, and if you ask me, they're all here hidin' out or somethin' I don't know…" Ellis said.

"Ellis, we ain't got time for this shit." Coach said.

"Okay…but I'm just wonderin'."

Suddenly echoes of gurgling, screeching, groaning, and growling surrounded them.

"Oh, this is gonna get bad." Ellis said.

Suddenly a Smoker's scream was head and Ellis was snared by its tongue and dragged backwards.

"Ellis!" Rochelle shouted.

Suddenly a Spitter launched her acid all on the ground around the survivors, causing them to scatter.

As they went in different directions, a Hunter jumped from behind a ruined building and pounced Francis. Instantly after a Jockey ran up and grabbed a hold of Rochelle.

"Get this thing off of my face!" Rochelle shouted.

"GET IT OFF!" Francis shouted.

As the remaining survivors struggled to free their friends, more and more havoc began to spread them apart even further.

Just as the Jockey grabbed a hold of Rochelle, a Charger ran toward the group and grabbed onto Coach who had opened fire on the Smoker, attempting to free Ellis.

"Shit!" He yelled.

"They're pickin' us off!" Nick shouted.

Bill stepped toward the Smoker and finally freed Ellis.

"You all right, son?" He asked as he approached Ellis.

"Yeah, I just go the wind knocked outta me o' somethin' fierce." He said.

"Francis!" Zoey called as she shoved and shot the Hunter off of Francis.

Nick hunted down the Jockey while Louis ran after the Charger.

Coach was incapacitated when Louis finally got to him. He shot the Charger until it collapsed onto the ground. He reached down to help up Coach.

"I'll be all right." He said to Louis.

Rochelle was being steered forward past Coach when Nick finally caught up to her and shot the Jockey off of her.

"Hey, you all right?" He asked as he approached her.

"I'm a little dizzy…" She said. "But I'll be okay in a little while." She shook her head. "I wonder why it led me this way…"

Suddenly the light gurgles of a female Boomer were heard all but too late. Louis, Coach, Nick, and Rochelle were covered in vomit instantly as the Boomer called her friends to join in on the hunt and beat on them herself.

"Back off, bitch!" Zoey shouted as she ran up and began to shoot the nearby zombies and shoved the Boomer back before shooting her.

Bill, Francis, and Ellis also came in to defend their friends.

When the bile dissipated, the survivors had a moment to rest.

"We can't sit still for too long." Bill said. "They're really coming out of the woodwork around here."

"They seem to be more concentrated in this area." Rochelle said.

"Well if there's anyone that could have survived, it would be the military." Louis said.

"Let's keep goin'," Coach said. "It's gettin' near dark soon and ain't gonna travel at night."

"We can't afford to wait either." Bill said.

"Then we'd better haul ass." Francis said.

As they continued to walk through the town,

"Look, up there! I think I see smoke!" Rochelle said.

At the end of the town there was a pile of cars that blocked the road as a Semi had ended up blocking the entire road at the top of a hill. Cars were piled all around it, blocking the view of the road on the other side of the hill.

"Let's get on top of that truck." Zoey said. "Get a good view of the road."

"Maybe we can spot the military from there." Bill said.

The group approached the pile of abandoned cars and carefully walked onto them and approached the truck.

As they climbed atop the semi and looked downward at the bottom of the hill, they came upon a horrible sight.

At the base of the hill, in one large area, were flaming wreckages of military vehicles, and bodies of soldiers that were horribly maimed and mangled littered the ground everywhere. From large blood pools to many dislocated and mangled limbs to torsos and whole halves of the soldiers were missing or scattered across the scene. Smoke rose up from what was left of a vehicle's engine still slowly burning away.

"They're… all dead…" Louis said.

Zoey looked at Louis as he watched his only hope shatter before him in a bloody massacre.

Louis rubbed his forehead and shook his head in disbelief.

"Did anyone survive?" He said.

"It doesn't look likely." Nick said.

"They didn't make it…" Coach said as he stared at the bloody pile of bodies that littered the ground beneath them.

"Now that's a damn shame…" Ellis said.

"Poor bastards…" Bill said.

Louis just sighed and shook his head.

"I'm sorry, Louis." Zoey said. "Maybe there's another…"

"Another what?" Louis said sadly. "Another group of the military, another helpful soul that ends up turning into either an infected or dead…It's hard to go on not knowing if there's a destination at the end of your journey."

"Well maybe there's a chance that someone got away." Zoey said.

"From this?" Louis sighed. "Look around, you guys, this was our last hope…now we don't have anything to go on." He shook his head, becoming more agitated. "After all this, we went all this way to find out that they're all dead, instead of trying to make it to the coast where we know there's safety." He paused. "We blew it! We missed our chance, and now we have nothing left to go on!"

"Hey, take it easy Louis." Francis said. "There's gotta be somethin' left of this shit. You're not like yourself when you're not Mr. Positive, it makes me worry about ya."

Louis took a deep breath and nodded. "You're right, Francis. I shouldn't have lost my cool."

"In moments like these, I am thankful to know that there IS something at the end of that long road, and it is definitely worth the journey." Coach said.

"Amen to that!" Ellis said.

"The journey…" Louis said, deep in thought. "That's it!" He exclaimed. "If we can find out where they were going, then there's still hope left after all. Quick, search for any evidence or mention of a specific location that we can get to."

"Good thinking." Francis said. "It's good to have the ol' Louie back."

As the survivors began to examine the horrible sight before them, they came upon uniforms and faces of people they recognized from the base.

Bill walked into the middle of the wreckage and found what he believed to be the remains of the General in charge of the group. All that was visibly intact was the man's hat and uniform. The mass that lay underneath the clothing was horribly mangled and torn apart that it was impossible to identify who, or even what, it may have once been.

"This is disgusting…" Nick said.

"This is war." Bill said as he walked away from the General's body. "There were over one hundred soldiers assigned to this unit, and we were supposed to be right along with them."

"Maybe it's fate that we didn't follow them." Zoey said.

"It did keep us alive…" Louis said.

One soldier's body lay outstretched toward a piece of broken metal. The body's position was rather odd for being attacked by zombies. It was almost as if he was reaching for something when he died.

"What is that?" Louis said as he approached.

He ran toward the peculiar position of the body and saw that something had been written on the metal piece in front of him. It read:

"Survivors,

We were attacked heading toward Alexandria for pickup at docks 30 mi NW."

"We gotta make it to Alexandria and make that pickup!" Coach said.

"That's right; we've got to move, and fast." Louis said.

"See? I told ya there'd be somethin'." Francis said.

"Finally, something to go on." Nick said.

"Just when you thought the whole world had gone away…" Zoey said.

"There's always a reason to be comin' back." Ellis replied.


	14. WE ARE IMMUNE AS SHIT!

Later in the evening, they finally arrived at an abandoned town outside of Alexandria. The streets were littered with staggering infected as they fought amongst themselves and occasionally vomited on themselves.

The buildings had blood smeared on them and bodies were scattered across the streets. Trash littered the dirt-covered streets while zombies wandered in and out of ruined buildings that covered the landscape. Everything from windows being broken to whole walls or floors missing from the nearby houses made the survivors worried that this area may have been hit the hardest by the waves of infected.

The zombies were immediately alerted to their presence and began to run in massive hordes toward the group.

The survivors shot and hacked apart any zombie that came up to claw them as they made their way through the town's streets and to the edge of town where the military had set up a helicopter landing pad and a radio in one of the nearby buildings.

"We can use that radio to signal the military." Louis said.

"Yeah, and we know how _that's_ gonna go." Francis said.

"Well this is it, people." Bill said.

"Time to stock up on supplies and fight this shit head on." Coach said.

"Yeah, grab this apocalypse by the horns!" Ellis cheered.

In the building on the front desk was a radio left by the military, still powered and running. The walls were cracked and dirty as the floors were blood flecked and there was a dead body slumped over in a corner. In the back room was a large stash of ammunition, explosives, first aid, and melee weapons. The survivors helped themselves to anything they could.

"Hey look, we got gas cans!" Ellis said.

"We should place them in a few good spots." Coach said.

"Yeah, let's do it." Ellis said as he eagerly picked up a gas can and ran out of the room with Coach right behind.

Zoey walked into the back room where the first aid was and began to heal herself. Nick came in and began to grab explosives and ammunition.

"After what happened to the military," She said, "It doesn't look too good of odds we'll escape."

"Well we're just going to have to find out." Nick said.

"It sucks that we might not make this," She said. "I hope you and I make it through all right."

She paused, waiting for Nick to answer. Instead, he stood reloading his gun; oblivious.

He stopped and turned around to face Zoey.

"Did you say something?"

She opened her mouth, but hesitated and shrugged. "It's nothing. Just thinking about what we've got to do."

"Well if you intend to get rescued I suggest you prepare for hell out there. I want to make it out of this goddamn apocalypse alive."

"Yeah, I'd rather not have you die." She said.

"Yeah, you're _really_ going to miss me." He said sarcastically as he rolled his eyes.

She opened her mouth to object when Louis poked his head through the doorway.

"It's time." He said. "You guys ready?"

They nodded.

As the rest of the group stood before their final stand, they hoped that no matter what came at them, that they would all prevail, no matter the odds.

"No man gets left behind." Bill said.

"What if we don't make it?" Rochelle said.

Louis smiled at her. "We'll make it."

"If this is the only thing that stands between me and safety, then I'll friggin' eat these bastards if I have to get through them." Francis said.

"That's bad for your hygiene, man." Ellis said. "Just remember to brush and clean yourself up when we get rescued."

"_If_…" Nick corrected.

"Oh I am definitely cleaning up the moment we get rescued; I cannot go another day like this!" Rochelle said.

"It'll be good to get some real food for once." Coach said.

"In case we don't make it," Zoey said. "I want you all to know that…I really enjoyed hanging out with you guys. You're the best group of people I've ever met."

"Thank you, Zoey." Louis said. "You have been a joy to fight alongside, as are the rest of you."

"You've been a fine addition to the team." Bill said. "It would be hard to go on without you."

"Come on, she ain't gone or anything." Ellis said. "Let's be happy that we made it! I mean it could have been worse, we could have not survived the mall, the carnival, the swamp, the pouring rain…"

"We've been through a lot, Ellis." Louis said.

"Well, I'll hit the radio when you're all ready." Bill said.

Rochelle nodded. "Yes, we're ready."

Nick glanced over at Zoey; her hands were shaking as she tightly gripped her shotgun.

"We'll be fine." He said to her.

"All right, let's start this shit up!" Ellis shouted.

Bill turned on the radio and spoke into the microphone.

"Hello?"

"Hello? Hello!" Spoke a voice back. "This is the Alexandria military base, identify yourselves."

"We're survivors of the military armada that was headed for your base. We've had complications, could you pick us up at the docks?"

"Roger that survivors, we're coming. Over and out."

"Okay, the military knows we're comin', so everyone get in position around these docks and get ready!" Louis shouted.

Coach went into the doorway while Zoey and Francis went outside toward another nearby boarded up building. Bill, Louis, and Ellis branched off toward the helicopter landing pad while Nick stood in between the groups.

As the horde screamed its infamous attack cry, the zombies began to swarm Rochelle as she was left all alone near the radio.

"Oh shit," She said as she began to shoot the zombies that came toward her. "Guys! Anyone? I'm not gonna be able to hold them back by myself!"

"I'm right here!" Coach shouted. "I ain't gonna leave you!"

Soon the zombies swarmed the entire pier, surrounding Rochelle and Coach.

"This isn't how I wanted this to go." She said.

"Watch out!" Coach shouted as a Charger ran though the zombies.

Rochelle saw the Charger and began to run out of its path, but wasn't quick enough.

"NOO!" She shouted as it grabbed tightly onto her and slammed her into the ground.

"Help!" She shouted.

Coach continued to shoot the Charger, but it continued to pound Rochelle into the ground.

"You fat mother, why don't you understand that you gonna die?" Coach said as he reached for his fire axe and hacked away at the Charger until it finally collapsed and died.

"You all right?" Coach asked.

Rochelle screamed as she looked onto the ground and saw a pool of blood begin to form beneath her.

"Oh my God…" She said.

"You're gonna make it!" Coach said as he began to lift her up. Suddenly a Hunter screech was heard and Coach was knocked onto the ground and pinned.

Rochelle reached for her Magnum to find it was just out of reach.

"Shit!" She screamed as she reached for the gun. With all her might she pushed herself to roll onto her side and in searing pain she grabbed tightly onto the Magnum and shot at the Hunter until it died.

She lay back down and began to hyperventilate.

"Are you okay?" She panicked.

Coach slowly lifted himself up.

"I think I'm gonna just make it!" He said as he quickly took pills. "But I ain't leavin' until I get you up!"

He reached down and helped Rochelle up as she shot a zombie that began to claw at Coach's back.

"Thanks!" She said as she stood up. "Cover me!" She shouted as she grabbed the First Aid off of her back.

Coach nodded and began to shoot the zombies that continued to surround them. As more and more came, Coach's stamina was waning and his injured knee began to buckle.

Rochelle was seconds away from patching herself up when she saw Coach's pain. She looked down at the first aid kit and back to Coach. Suddenly she ran up to Coach and began to heal him.

"Cut that out! You gotta save yourself!" Coach shouted.

"I can't do this alone, and I ain't lettin' you leave me!"

Coach stood tall now that his knee was bandaged and fought off the zombies while Rochelle took her pills and stood behind Coach.

Ellis kept shooting the horde as it began to push him away from his location. He ended up backing up toward the docks as the horde continued to swarm around him. Suddenly, a zombie reached outward toward Ellis and knocked his gun away while another one with long sharp claws gave a huge sharp at his stomach.

He gasped as a sudden rush of pain pierced his stomach.

Deep lacerations surrounding a large gash across Ellis' front began to gush with blood and pour down the front of him.

From a distance, Louis saw Ellis stagger backward, tightly holding onto his stomach as the blood coated his hands and arms red and ran down the front of him.

"ELLIS!" Louis shouted in shock.

He watched in horror as Ellis stood swaying on the edge of the pier.

"Oh man…" He said to himself. "Oh god…oh shit…"

Suddenly he felt his weight shift backwards. He looked up at Louis with a blank look.

Louis watched as Ellis was frozen in place for a moment, still holding tightly onto his wounds, and then suddenly fell backwards into the river, disappearing from sight.

"ELLIS!" He shouted as he attempted to fight off the zombies and make his way toward Ellis. He knocked the closest zombies away from him but was overwhelmed as a Charger ran at him and knocked him onto his right arm, fracturing it.

Louis screamed in pain as he grabbed his gun and continued shooting with his left hand and cradled his right arm close to his body.

Near the edge, Bill was keeping the zombies away from the landing zone when he heard splashing in the river and saw Ellis with his dying breath meagerly thrashing about to stay barely afloat.

"Hang on, I've got you! Don't you go under!" Bill shouted as he fought his way toward Ellis. As he slowly plowed through the horde, one zombie kicked Bill in his injured knee, causing it to buckle and Bill fell to the ground.

He looked past the legs of the zombies around him and saw small traces of water splashing near him.

Ellis continued to move his left arm to keep himself afloat while his right arm was still tightly held over his lacerations. The pain in his stomach seemed to make the feeling of exhaustion in his left arm go numb. He watched as the water level suddenly went above his eyes and continued to rise as his arm gave out. He saw a small amount of bubbles float to the top as his last breath failed him.

Suddenly an arm shot through the water and held tightly onto his shirt and pulled him up to the surface.

"You'e not done yet!" Bill shouted.

Ellis grabbed onto a piece of the dock's plywood as Bill knelt in front of him and helped him up. Ellis lay face down on the docks, coughing water out of his lungs as he continued to bleed onto the docks.

"I'm not letting go of you until they get you on that chopper, you hear me mister?" Bill said as he carefully helped Ellis up.

"You guys all right?" Louis asked as he made his way to them and continued to shoot the zombies away from the three of them.

"Cover me." He commanded Louis

Bill reached onto his back and grabbed his first aid kit.

"You need this more than I do." He said as he began to patch up Ellis' wounds.

Ellis nodded as he continued to cough up water. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and watched as Bill managed to keep his stomach sealed in the bandage.

Bill stood up and helped Ellis up carefully. He grabbed an auto-shotgun that was nearby and handed it to Ellis.

"You good to go, soldier?"

"Yessir, I think I can manage." Ellis said gratefully.

Bill winced as he leaned too much of his weight onto his wounded knee.

The zombies still continued to swarm the three as they began to make their way from the pier.

"You all right?" Ellis said as he shot a nearby group of zombies.

"I'll manage." Bill said. He looked toward Louis. "You got any first aid, Louis?"

"No man, I grabbed a defibrillator."

"Shit."

"You need help?" Louis asked.

"I'll make it."

As Nick continued to shoot the zombies that surrounded and clawed at him in the middle of the docks, he looked over the horde in the distance as the Tank landed right in front of Zoey. It roared loudly and in one swift movement, knocked Zoey away from him and she flew into a nearby wall and fell to the ground.

She slowly got up, her back in pain as she felt a sharp pain shoot down her leg. She looked to see her right ankle to be sprained. She screamed in agony as she tried to walk on it, only increasing her suffering. She propped herself up against the wall only to see the Tank running straight for her.

Francis saw the Tank in motion and ran up to shoot the Tank.

But he was too late.

The Tank pounded Zoey down to the ground, causing her hand to quickly grasp onto her chest, now in terrible pain.

Nick watched the Tank's movements and became enraged.

"NO!" he shouted as he shot and shoved the zombies off of him. He ran as fast as he could toward Zoey as Francis continued to fire upon the Tank.

Louis and Ellis began to shoot the Tank as well while Coach tossed his last pipe bomb to draw the other zombies away.

Zoey used every bit of her energy to attempt to stand up as she held tightly onto her shotgun, but the Tank took another swing at her, slamming his large meaty fist into her chest, knocking the wind out of her as she tumbled backwards.

"Hey!" Francis called to the Tank. "You want a fair fight? Come on! Hit me with your best shot!"

Francis fired a shot into the Tank's shoulder, causing him to look away from Zoey's body and toward Francis.

"That's right, come to papa!" He said as he fired his shotgun into the Tank's face.

The Tank growled at Francis angrily and picked up a nearby piece of rubble over its head and launched it toward Francis.

Francis stood motionless as the rubble went over his head and crushed the zombies that were running up to him from behind. Despite the chaos, Francis didn't even blink.

"Can't even hit me yourself, you pussy?" He shouted as he began to shoot the Tank in the face once more.

The Tank grew angrier with Francis' shots and roared once more at him.

Francis pulled the trigger on his shotgun to find out he had run out of shells.

"Shit!" He said as he quickly reached into his pocket and grabbed a handful of shotgun shells.

The Tank saw Francis pause in his shooting and picked up another piece of rubble and threw it toward him.

Francis looked up toward the Tank as he reloaded just in time to see a piece of rubble fly toward him. His eyes widened as he stood unprepared.

Suddenly a shot was heard and the rubble piece broke apart before it reached him. He turned to see Nick holding Zoey's shotgun as he ran up to Francis.

"Help me kill this bastard!" Nick shouted as he opened fire upon the Tank.

"This is for Zoey you big meaty motherfucker!" Francis shouted.

The two continued to shoot the Tank as it began to run for them, then

finally fell to its knees and died before them.

Nick and Francis ran up to Zoey, who lay motionless, aside from her breathing quickly and clutching her chest.

"God dammit!" Francis said. "You can make it! You just gotta get up!"

He reached down toward her left side as Nick went up to the other side and knelt next to her.

"Don't quit on me like this!" He commanded. "Let's go, get yourself up!"

"Come on! Help me get her up!" Francis called as he began to carefully lift her up.

"We need some help over here!" He shouted toward the other survivors, hoping someone would hear his call.

"I'm coming!" Rochelle shouted.

"We gotta get everyone together!" Coach said. "I'll go round up the rest!"

With Francis by her left shoulder, Louis on her right, the survivors carried what was left of Zoey to the chopper. Coach cleared the way for them to walk while Rochelle and Nick shot the zombies behind them as they attempted to grab and claw at Zoey one last time. Behind them, Bill had his arm wrapped around Ellis' back, and Ellis held onto Bill in the same manner as Ellis held tightly onto the laceration across his stomach that squirted blood with every step he took. Bill kept his assault rifle in his other hand and shot the few stray zombies that came too close to them.

With their last ounce of energy, they brought Zoey into the chopper safely and avoided the ever growing horde.

"Anyone got first aid?" Nick shouted.

"No, it's all gone!" Rochelle shouted.

"Shit!" Francis and Nick snapped.

"We have people who need immediate medical attention here!" Bill shouted to the chopper pilot. "If you have any medical supplies, we need them NOW!"

The pilot nodded and sent the medical officer in the co-pilot seat to go into the back of the chopper and clear a table that the survivors gently set Zoey on. The officer hooked Zoey up to an IV that was attached to the side and carefully bandaged up her right leg. As he moved her leg into an extended position, she screamed in agonizing pain and gripped tightly onto the side of the table. She continued to breathe quickly as her face was filled with pain and her left hand tightly clutched her chest as blood gushed out of a seeping wound on her upper stomach. The survivors all stood against the walls of the chopper, watching.

"It looks like she might have massive internal bleeding underneath this wound." The soldier said. "She's a hell of a fighter if she's lasted this long." He continued to look over her as she writhed on the table in searing pain. "Luckily she isn't showing signs of a collapsed lung, but chances are she ruptured something internally."

"Well she's quite a trooper," Bill said. "She'll hang on as long as she can."

"Hey man, what about me?" Ellis said as he lifted his shirt, exposing the patched up wound beneath him.

"Are you experiencing any other pain?"

"No man, it just hurts."

"We'll have you checked out when we reach the base, I promise."

Just then, Zoey's body quickly jumped and stiffened up as her breathing began to quicken.

"What's happening?" Nick asked.

"I'm losing her!" The officer said. "Her heart's giving out."

"No, no! Come on!" Nick panicked.

"Hang in there, Zoey!" Louis said, his voice beginning to shake. "You can pull through this!"

"Oh shit," Coach said sadly. "That ain't easy to walk away from…"

Francis shook his head while Rochelle began to cry.

"Come on, girl, you can do this! Get up! It ain't over yet!" Ellis shouted at her in a panic.

She suddenly began to cough and from her mouth came blood.

"Oh, Jesus Christ." Nick said as he turned away. "You gotta hang in there for us, okay? We're gonna take you to the hospital." He knelt by her. "You're not going to quit on me. I…"

Suddenly Zoey's body relaxed and ceased to move. Her eyes seemed to stare off into oblivion, as if she had seen a feeling of peace just before the end.

"Oh no…" Louis said.

"Oh, shit." Francis said.

"That's it… She's gone." Bill said, tearing up.

"Oh, man." Ellis said as he looked away. "I can't deal with this…"

"It's not over." Louis said. "There's always hope, guys!"

"Fuck your hope!" Francis snapped.

Nick shook his head sadly. "God dammit!" He shouted as he stood up in anger.

"It wasn't worth the loss..." Rochelle said.

"Well she's gone now, so it doesn't freakin' matter, now does it?" Nick said.

"It's not over yet!" Louis said. "I have a defibrillator! She can still be saved!"

He reached onto his back and grabbed onto the defibrillator as he approached Zoey's lifeless body.

"She'll pull through this, she'll be fine." Rochelle said. "Right?"

Ellis shook his head. "I don't know…"

"She'll be fine!" Bill said.

"Wait!" Nick said. He paused, hesitant of his decision. "…I'll do it."

Louis nodded and handed Nick the defibrillator.

Nick charged up the defib unit and pressed the paddles onto Zoey's chest.

"There's always hope…" Louis said.

"Come on, dammit! Work!" Nick shouted.

Zoey's body jolted as her eyes opened wide and she gasped for air.

"Hey! It worked! She's back!" Louis exclaimed.

The group all held their breath as they watched Zoey regain full consciousness.

Nick threw the defibrillator aside and watched her begin to breathe normally.

"I don't know what the hell you were thinking, but you've got to have balls to pull a stunt like that." He said with a smirk.

Zoey looked at him and smiled as she opened her mouth to speak, but then quickly closed her eyes as she reached for her chest with her other hand and continued to cough.

"Hey, take it easy." Nick said softly. "You'll be all right."

She carefully nodded. "I'll be fine, don't worry about me." She managed to say. She coughed once more, but this time there was no blood.

Louis sighed with relief as Ellis and Coach smiled.

"Here, let me help you up." Nick said.

"I'm all right," Zoey said as she slowly sat up. "I'll need some extra bandaging up, but I'm fine." She said as she got in a comfortable position on the gurney.

"Zoey!" Louis said as he hugged her.

Nick slowly backed away as the rest of the survivors surrounded her with care and happiness. He wiped his forehead with his arm and noticed the blood on his sleeve. He looked down at his suit to find himself covered in Zoey's blood.

"Damn, we thought you were gonna leave us and to off to a better place." Coach said.

"I told you she was a fighter." Bill said.

"You can't scare me like that!" Rochelle said with a faint smile. "I thought you were a goner!"

"Nah, she's tough." Francis said. "Even if she didn't come back, I'd beat the life back into her!"

Ellis looked at Zoey and smiled.

"Aw man, it sucks that we got hurt, but we're gonna make it! It's like the time my buddy Keith tried making his own fireplace out of a hollowed-out hole in a tree and some gasoline and metal support beams…well…he survived, anyhow."

Zoey smiled and laughed.

"Yeah…we'll survive..."


	15. The Military's Gonna Take Care of Us

"Please sir, you're going to need some medical attention." Said a nurse.

"I don't need anything; I've survived worse than a simple knee problem." Bill snapped.

The survivors were once again back in the hands of the military. Bill was in what seemed to be an abandoned home turned into a military hospital. The walls were coated in portable machinery as it was stacked up on makeshift tables and in the middle of the room was a military cot, where Bill lay as a nurse gave him a quick checkup.

"I said I'm fine." Bill said to her. "You should put your services to better use elsewhere."

In the next room, two cots were put in a larger room with similar machinery stacked up beside each cot. Sitting up on the edge of the cot was Ellis while another nurse removed the bandages from Ellis' stomach and checked on the lacerations.

"How am I lookin'?" He asked.

"Well…" The nurse said as she paused, examining the wounds. "It looks like your lacerations will heal all right in due time, no major organ damage has been detected, but if you feel any pain you let me know, okay?"

Ellis nodded happily.

"Okay."

"And don't bump your stomach too hard, okay?"

Ellis nodded and stood up from the cot. He looked over at the other cot that was on the other side of the room. Hooked up to various machines and monitors, Zoey slept soundly as the nurses occasionally checked on her state. Ellis approached the bed and looked at Zoey as she slept calmly, unaware of what was happening around her. He smiled as he stared at her. He watched as the nurse left the room and went to check on Louis who was in the next room.

As Ellis looked through the doorway to check to see if anyone else was nearby, he knelt by Zoey's cot and smiled at her.

"Hey…I don't know if yer hearin' me or not, but I am sure gonna miss ya if we end up partin' ways. Now I know it'd be a hell of a nicer place than anythin' we got out here, but we sure as hell gonna miss the shout outta ya if you don't come through this, ya hear? You're like a big sister to me; y'all are the best family I coulda ever asked for. I'd have never made it this far without y'all lookin' after me and stuff. So you hang in there for us, okay?"

He stood up from the cot and wiped his face with his wrist. He walked out of the room and ran into Nick who was walking down the hallway.

"Oh hey Nick." Ellis said.

Nick stopped walking and nodded. "Well you're looking better."

"I'll be all right, the doc fixed me up real good, said I should be fine in a couple weeks."

"Well that's great, Ellis. I'm glad to hear you'll live to see another day in hell." Nick said. He glanced past Ellis toward the doorway of Zoey's room.

Ellis looked over his shoulder at the doorway and looked back at Nick with a smile.

"Ho-lee shit, you're in lo…"

"Shut the fuck up, farm boy."

Ellis smiled and nodded. "I can do that.

"How is she…?" Nick asked calmly.

"I don't know to tell ya the truth, but I think she'll do just fine. You goin' to see her?"

Nick nodded. "Well, if she's not busy."

"Well she's sleepin' right now, but I'm sure she'll be happy to see ya if you wanna try and say somethin'."

"Nah, it's okay." Nick shook his head. "I'm not sure if I was even going to stay or not."

"You came on down here away from our rooms to come visit and you're not gonna stay?" Ellis said. "Now who ain't right in the head?" He smirked as he walked away.

Nick stared as Ellis walked away from him. He shook his head; puzzled.

"Why do I even subject myself to this kid's advice in the freakin' first place?" He said to himself.

He began to walk down the hallway and glanced into Zoey's room when the sight of her caused him to stop in his tracks. He looked down the hallway, then back at the room. He stared at Zoey as she lay peacefully in the cot. He then shook his head and began to walk down the hallway once more. Suddenly he stopped cold as he closed his eyes and sighed. He winced with guilt and turned toward the hospital room door and stared at the doorway. He lowered his shoulders in defeat and walked into her room.

She lay in her white tee shirt, her red hoodie lay draped over a chair in the nearby corner. She had a gray blanket covering her lower body as bandages were visible through her shirt that seemed to wrap all the way around her waist. Her ankle was also in a small cast. Various scratches and gashes were visible on her face and arms. Despite her appearance, her face seemed to be full of life and comfort as she slept soundly despite the machinery and the constant flow of visitors.

He walked over next to her cot and stood, staring at her for a moment. He sighed and shook his head.

"Hey," He said softly to her as he sat next to her bed.

Zoey slowly opened her eyes and looked over at him.

"Hey," She said calmly with a faint smile. She then looked away from him and her smile faded. "What do you want?"

He shook his head and sighed. "Nothing. I just thought…" He looked away. "What the hell am I doing?" He said to himself. "You'll never listen…"

"What is it?" She asked.

"It's nothing." He said as he stood up. "It was a big mistake." He looked over his shoulder at her. "Have a good nap." He said as he started to head out of the room.

"Thank you…" She said to him.

Nick froze and turned to look back at her in surprise.

"Thank you for saving me." She said. "I know it was you, I guess I always did."

He sighed. "No big deal."

"Yes it was…" She said as she sat up in her bed. "You saved my life; I think that at least deserves a thank you." She glanced at the chair next to her bed. "Sit down."

He walked over toward the chair and sat down to face her.

"What do you want?" He asked.

"I want to know something." She said. "You tried to tell me something right when we were rescued." She smiled. "What was it?"

"Believe me," He said. "It's not important."

"What, you're not going to tell me?" She asked.

"It's not worth telling, really." He said. "Besides, you probably wouldn't like it and just give me shit over it for the rest of our pathetic lives."

"Oh come on, you can tell me. After all we've been through, you're not going to say it?"

"Say what? Do you even know what I was going to say?"

"Well I would if you would just tell me…"

Suddenly Nick leaned in toward Zoey and pulled her close and kissed her. He pulled away slightly and stared at her.

"You hear that? That is the sound of you not talking." He smirked. "Now that wasn't so hard, was it?"

Zoey leaned forward and gave Nick a kiss.

"Hear that?" She said with a sarcastic tone. "That is the sound of you not _complaining_ all the time. You think you can handle that?"

"You're kidding, right?"

Zoey smiled.

"Slide over." Bill said as he walked up to Coach as he sat by a table in the lounge room.

"Hey, man! How you feelin'?" Coach said as he stood up and offered Bill his chair. "You're a hell of a hearty old man to be still hangin' in there after all this time."

"It's gonna take a hell of a lot more than some piece of shit apocalypse to kill me." Bill said as he sat down. "This bullshit knee has got all the damn nurses hopping and thinking that I'm just gonna keel over or something."

"Hey, we ain't sittin' here with one foot in the grave; they got no right treatin' us like we're a bunch o' old coots." Coach said.

"Health care these days…" Bill said.

"Hey guys!" Ellis said as him and Rochelle approached. "Have you seen this place? There's some real hi-tech shit around here."

"The hospital has quite a bit of excess technology." Rochelle said. "I think they've been hiding it on us in case of a random emergency."

"Well this was one hell of an emergency." Bill said. "Makes you wonder what they were preparing for with all of this."

"Maybe they always feared a zombie apocalypse…" Ellis said.

"Oh hell no!" Rochelle said. "They were so not taking taxpayer's money and using it toward backup equipment and guns."

"Makes you wonder…" Ellis said.

Just then Nick and Louis entered the room and saw the group talking.

"Looks like they're having fun as always." Louis said. "It's always good to know you have friends that got your back."

"Yeah, that's great…" Nick said sarcastically. "I think I'm gonna sit this one out."

"You're not going to come and chat with us?" Louis asked.

Nick shook his head. "I'll leave it to you guys."

"Well if you ever need anything, you're welcome to come and talk with us."

"Yeah, thanks." Nick said as he left.

"And the way they think they need to treat us 'cause of our age." Coach said.

"What happened?" Louis asked. "The nurses give you guys a hassle?"

"That nurse had the nerve to try to convince me I need to be in a wheelchair." Bill said, annoyed.

"After all we've been through," Louis said as he sat down. "And they have the nerve to offer us only a wheelchair?"

"They won't be sayin' that shit when they're old and gray and standin' in that spot."

"They'd better have learned to keep their damn mouth shut at that age!"

"Yeah, or we gonna push them out slidin' on their own damn peels."

Coach and Bill laughed.

Rochelle stared at their sudden laughter; puzzled at the joke.

"My granddaddy slipped on a banana peel once…but…it wasn't that funny…"Ellis said.

"Ellis…" Louis said.

"Okay."

The group continued to chat as Francis entered the room and sat down in a chair far from the group, but not out of earshot.

"You know, I am truly amazed that we even made it this far." Rochelle said. "With all that shit that we've been through, it makes you think how we all managed to survive all this time."

"You know what I call that?" Coach said. "That right there is divine intervention."

"You actually _believe_ that crap?" Francis said to them.

If it's what keeps me goin', then I ain't leavin' it behind. But you can feel free to make a different choice in this matter anytime you like." Coach said.

"Good, 'cause I chose to ignore it." Francis said.

"There's always a pessimist." Coach mumbled.

"I believe it." Ellis said. "I mean if you think about it, we been fightin' a hundred million zombies and probably will be for the rest of our long days. There ain't no way we made it this far on our own. We got to have had some help, like a Guardian Angel or somethin'."

"Ah, I see." Louis said with an intrigued smirk. "You're a Catholic boy."

"Yeah, I was raised that way by my folks who were raised that way by their folks."

"But he knows how to hold a gun and every swear word in the books." Coach chuckled as he shook his head.

"You believe in that stuff, don't you Bill?" Ellis asked.

"You learn to believe and trust in a hell of a lot of strange things when you're down in the trenches." Bill said as he lit a cigarette. "You just gotta know what instincts to trust."

"Well put, sir." Ellis said. "Couldn't have said it better myself."

"Yeah, but you didn't." Francis said.

"I thank the Lord every mornin' that I get up for that one more day that we got the chance to fight for our lives."

"Sometimes you need all the help you can get." Louis said. "If there is anything in the world that you have that keeps you going, then it's all worth it in the end."

"You can thank whatever other 'divine power' you want, I say it's 'cause we blew the fuckers sky high."

"Oh, man! With the right tools, and the right firepower! Like with pipe bombs, how they all go flyin' with the explosions…"

"Ellis, take it easy." Rochelle said. "We don't need you going on another rant about the zombies. We made it. We're inside, and they're outside."

"And they better stay that way." Francis said. "Or I'm gonna have to kick some serious zombie ass."

"Take it easy, Francis." Bill said. "Wouldn't want you to accidentally kick your big ego in the ass too."

"What about your big beard, can I kick that?"

"Come on, guys." Louis said. "It's not worth the effort."

"There wouldn't be any effort to it…" Francis said.

"Come on, lighten up a little bit." Rochelle said.

Francis glared at Rochelle, and then fell silent as he continued to listen to their conversation.

"You know, you really got to hand it to the military to want to help us and take care of us."

"I don't know, man." Ellis said. "The military was doin' some serious bombing shit on us when we were in New Orleans. We didn't know what the hell was goin' on…"

"They did what they had to do to keep the infection from spreading." Bill said. "In the mind of the military, every course of action that the General made was necessary."

"God rest his soul." Coach said. "He was a good man; he took good care of us."

"If it wasn't for that wave that hit us, he'd still be here." Rochelle said.

"Now that's a damn shame…" Ellis said solemnly.

"Well that Captain that greeted us and brought us to the hospital seemed really nice. I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to catch his name."

"Uh…Lynch!" Rochelle said as she remembered. "I remember it was written on his nametag."

"Well I think we all owe Captain Lynch a big thank you for all this." Coach said. "Even with his commanding officer gone, he still is keeping things together."

"Unfortunately he's not the one in charge." Bill said. "There's always a second in command, and I doubt the General would have picked a Captain to be his underling. In his death, someone got a big promotion."

"I wonder who he is." Rochelle said.

"I don't think he's the same as Captain Lynch." Louis said as he looked up toward the doorway and watched a tall muscular pale skinned man in a high rank uniform walk into the main hallway. He looked around the area with a look of disgust as he walked up to the survivors in the lounge.

"Good evening, I'm General Stewart." He said. "And you must be the civilians we picked up not too long ago that were supposedly traveling with General Hildebrandt?"

"Yes sir, we are." Louis said.

"Well I trust you are all comfortable here and that my personnel are seeing to fit all of your needs and keep you all well protected and within these premises. If not I will see to it that you are given the proper…accommodations." He paused as stared at Francis, almost looking down upon him. He then quickly looked toward the rest of the group and donned a fake smile. "There are more of you, yes?"

"Two more." Rochelle said.

"One of them is still in the hospital." Bill said coldly.

"And the other?" General Stewart asked.

"He's…somewhere." Louis said.

"Well I suggest you find him. It would be safer and a very wise decision if all eight of you were kept together."

He quickly left the room and exited the house heading toward a house next door that the military had taken and turned into their base of operations. As he approached, one of the officers held the door open for him as he entered.

"Well isn't he just a ray of sunshine." Rochelle said.

"I'd like to kick his ass a couple of times." Francis said.

"What the hell's up with him roundin' us up like that?" Ellis asked. "What are we, cattle or somethin'?"

"We might be…" Bill said to himself.

"I doubt the military would do anything hostile toward us, they're supposed to be protecting us."

"Well that man does not seem like the kind who enjoys savin' those in need." Coach said.

"That wasn't Lynch." Rochelle said. "He can't seriously work for this guy."

"He has no choice." Louis said.

General Stewart walking into his office and stood staring at his personnel, thinking.

"Colonel." He called.

A young man who was slightly shorter than him with a pale face and brown hair approached. He too had a uniform of high rank and saluted Stewart.

"Yes, General." Lynch said.

"These civilians are a major threat to our operation."

"Sir?"

"Their very existence puts our entire plan in jeopardy and they must be dealt with. The virus, they are indeed carriers, are they not?"

"Sir, with all due respect, we have no evidence of them being carriers. Either way if they are immune or carriers then so are we-"

"I am not a carrier!" Stewart snapped. "I am immune, as are we all. We are the elite, the chosen few you could call it. We do not carry this ridiculous virus, but it is within them. Everywhere they go the plague and infected follow suit. You saw it happen to General Hildebrandt, did you not?"

"Sir, please, there's no link to the civilians and the infected…"

"Do not disrespect me, Colonel!"

Lynch fell silent.

Stewart continued to talk to Lynch as he slowly paced back and forth behind his desk.

"You are quick to protect these people, Lynch, I do not understand why. But they must be dealt with nonetheless. In two days at 0800 hours, you will round up these civilians and bring them out back to the test site and prepare them."

"Prepare them for what, sir?"

He stopped walking and stared at Lynch.

"For their execution."


	16. Or Line Us Up Against The Wall

Bright light shined down from a lamp above the bed as a nurse came into the hospital room to do a routine check on the patient's monitors.

"Good evening, how are you feeling?" She said as she saw the patient was coming to. "You've been out a couple days, and you've had a lot of visitors."

Zoey slowly sat up and stretched as she looked around the room.

"Am I okay?" She asked.

"You're actually doing remarkably well." The nurse said. "Better than we had ever expected, actually. You should be able to leave here if you can get yourself up."

"That won't be a problem." Zoey said as she sat up and swung her feet over the side.

"Do you think you'll be able to get up?" The nurse said to her as she unhooked the machines from Zoey's arms.

Zoey smiled as she stood up. "Yeah, I'll be able to get out of here tonight. They're waiting for me…"

"Yeah!" Ellis shouted. "Let's git this party goin'!"

In celebration of their successful rescue as well as withstanding the infected, the survivors accompanied with a handful of soldiers decided to enjoy themselves the best they could and throw a small party.

On one side of the lounge room was a jukebox very similar to the ones that Ellis had discovered through their travels back in Georgia. Higher rank officers tapped into their hidden stashes of alcohol and lined the bar on the other end of the room with various bottles. The room itself had simple light gray walls and flooring, but this time the tables that were scattered across the floor were decorated with makeshift tablecloths and decorations made of fishing line holding up a string of beer cans hung from the ceiling. Some soldiers were bold enough to take pages from dirty magazines and stick them onto the walls for some risqué decorating.

"Let's get some music going!" One soldier shouted as he began to program the jukebox.

Captain Lynch walked into the room and headed for the bar. He poured himself a glass of wine and asked the bartender to pour more and hand them out to the group.

Bill, Rochelle, Francis, Louis, Coach, and Ellis were still talking in the lounge when the bartender passed around the drinks.

"Too bad Zoey had to miss this." Louis said as he stood next to Francis with his glass, observing the work the soldiers had done to fix up the lounge for the party.

"You kiddin'? She's anti-social." Francis said. "Like I wish I could be right now."

"Oh come on now, Francis." Louis said. "Why would you want to pass up a chance to drink at the bar and associate with some real quality people?"

"Well at least the drinking will help me deal with the people." Francis smirked.

At that moment, Lynch stood on a chair in the middle of the room in front of everyone, preparing to make a speech.

"Good evening, I'd like to dedicate this party to the men and women who have risked their lives for their friends and have truly deserved their right to live in this apocalypse. I'd like to dedicate this to my soldiers for their hard work, but this especially applies to the people who have been keeping us going here, the eight survivors that we picked up a few months ago that have managed to make their way back to us against all odds." He raised his glass. "To the survivors..."

"Thank you, sir." Louis said as he raised his glass.

"That was quite a speech." Bill said as he too lifted his glass.

Lynch stepped down from the chair and approached the group.

"If I may, I'd like to tell you all that I believe what you all have done again and again has restored my faith in the human race."

"Thank you, sir." Coach said. "And it is an honor to have someone of the military actually want to take care of us."

"I wish I could say that applies to all of us, but sadly at times I think only a majority of us believe it."

"Some unfriendly commanders in the ranks?" Bill asked.

"Well I wish I could say." Lynch said. "But I'm afraid I cannot stay, there is much work that has to be done, and my commanding officer wishes to speak with me about an upcoming matter. I hope to see you all again soon."

"The same to you, Lynch." Rochelle said.

Just as Lynch walked out, Nick walked into the lounge.

"Hey, Nick!" Louis said as he approached him. "Where have you been? We're celebrating!"

"I've been around. What's all this for?" He asked.

"This is for us surviving the odds and just plain happy to be alive!" He said happily.

"Sounds great, there any alcohol around this party?"

"Plenty at the bar." Louis said as he walked with Nick toward the bar.

"Whoa, look at the legs on _her!_" Francis said as he passed the two and stared at one of the pictures from the dirty magazines on the wall.

"That's a favorite of me and the boys." Said one soldier.

Francis turned to the soldier and smirked. "Got any more?"

"Hell yes." The soldier said as he walked toward Francis pulled out a magazine from underneath one of the tables.

"Here you go, but don't forget to give it back when you're done!"

Francis chuckled triumphantly as he passed Louis and sat on the far side of the bar next to Ellis.

"Hey man, what you got?" Ellis said as he glanced over at the magazine.

"Hello Miss September!" Francis exclaimed. He then quickly rifled through the rest of the pages and closed the magazine.

"Eh, it's crap." Francis said. "Want it?"

Ellis smiled mischievously. "I'll take it."

"Don't let Mr. Sunshine catch you with it." Francis said. "He'll get his panties all in a bunch."

"It'll put hair on your chest!" The soldier shouted to Ellis.

Ellis smiled at the soldier as he began to walk away with the magazine.

"Hol-ee shit Miss September!" He said as began to walk out of the room.

He leaned against the doorway and stared at the magazine pages with an excited look.

Nick glanced at Ellis and shook his head.

"Well don't you look like you just stole candy from a baby." He said to him.

"Well I feel like I found some candy, but this ain't from no baby!" Ellis giggled.

"More like the cat that swallowed the canary." Said a voice from behind Ellis.

Ellis whirled around in surprise and hid the magazines behind his back to see Zoey standing behind him with a smug smirk on her face and a raised eyebrow.

"What you got there, Ellis?" She asked.

"Uh...nothin'." He said as he shifted his stance, embarrassed.

Suddenly his grip loosened on the magazines and the pages from inside fell apart onto the floor behind Ellis.

Zoey leaned slightly to her left past Ellis and looked at the magazine pages on the floor.

"Nothing, huh?" She asked sarcastically.

"Ellis!" Louis exclaimed. "Where did you get those?"

Ellis whirled around and faced Louis. "I uh…I got them from Francis." He said.

"Did NOT!" Francis shouted across the room.

"You're in trouble now." Zoey said as she walked up next to Ellis.

Louis quickly looked at Zoey in surprise.

"Zoey! …Hey, Zoey's back, everyone! She's okay!"

The group stood up and walked up to Zoey with smiles and many congratulations on her recovery.

"You pulled through some serious shit back there." Coach said.

"About time you got better," Francis said. "These guys are boring me to death over here."

"Welcome back, girl." Rochelle said as she hugged her. "It just hasn't been the same without you."

"You can say that again." Bill said.

"Thanks you guys." Zoey said. "I know I wasn't really awake when you all came to see me, but I'm glad you all came anyway. It really meant a lot to hear you guys."

"Glad you could hear us." Louis said.

"I knew you could do it!" Ellis said.

"It was hard." Zoey said. "It was the biggest thing I've ever had to endure."

"That's what _she_ said." Francis said with a smirk.

"_But not to you!"_ Zoey said with a triumphant smile.

"Oh, shit!" Ellis said.

Louis chuckled.

"Hey come on, play some good music!" Shouted one soldier as he walked up to the jukebox and stared at the song list.

"Here we go!" He said. "How about we play Re: Your Brains?"

"NO!" All the survivors shouted as they looked at the soldier in alarm.

"Don't do it, man!" Ellis said as him and Louis held their hands out, motioning the soldier to stop his action.

The soldier stared at the survivors nervously and hit a different button on the jukebox as the survivors continued to socialize and enjoy themselves.

"This party is awesome!" Ellis shouted.

"Doesn't take much to make you happy, does it?" Francis said.

"Says the man who is obsessed with shiny objects!" Shouted Zoey toward Francis.

Suddenly they were alerted to the sound of one of the soldiers spitting and coughing.

"What the hell is this shit?" The soldier asked his friends next to him. The three were sitting around one of the tables near the jukebox.

"It's Ginger Beer!" One spoke up through his laughter. "It proves how manly you are by how well you handle this shit."

"Hey, can I try some?" Ellis said.

The soldier looked up at Ellis, still coughing.

"Go ahead!" He said as he stood up and walked up to Ellis. "This stuff is nasty, I don't want anything to do with it!"

"Wuss!" His friends called out from where they sat.

"Shut up!" He said to them as he sat back down at the table.

Ellis sat down next to Zoey at the bar and set the bottle down in between the two.

"Now I never had this stuff but Keith used to drink it all the time when he wasn't drunk and he turned out all right."

Ellis sat with a smile on his face as he took a big gulp out of the brown bottle. Suddenly he leaned forward and began to cough as he put a hand up to his throat.

"Aw, man this shit is evil!" Ellis said.

"Is it really that terrible?" Zoey asked.

Ellis nodded.

"Here, let me try." She said as she picked up the bottle and began to drink it.

Ellis' jaw dropped as he watched Zoey polish off the bottle of revolting ginger beer.

"Uh Zoey…" He asked. "…what other cool stuff can you do?"

Zoey laughed.

Suddenly a familiar tune to a few of the survivors on the jukebox, causing Ellis to pause as he heard the song begin to play and recognized it.

"Shit, it's the Midnight Riders!" He said excitedly.

"Hell yeah!" Francis shouted. "This is good bar fight music!"

"Shit, the Midnight Riders ain't just for havin' bar fights." Coach said.

"Yeah, they're good for lightin' stuff on fire!" Ellis said.

"Well that's it for me." Nick said. "I am not sticking around to hear this being played again." He stood up from his bar stool and cracked his neck.

"You going off to bed?" Louis asked.

"You could say that." Nick said as he left the lounge.

"Well good night." Louis said.

"Actually, I think I'm going to turn in too." Zoey said. "It's been a long day."

She stood up from the bar and waved to the group.

"Good night, guys."

The rest waved and said good night as Zoey left the room.

She walked out into the hallway and slowly made her way up the stairs. When she came to the hallway that housed the survivor's individual rooms, she walked up to her door and looked down the hall and to believe that she was alone.

"Great…" She said to herself.

"You obviously wanted to find me alone." Nick said as he opened her door to reveal himself leaning against the door frame.

She looked at him and smiled. "I was hoping that I'd get a chance to maybe chat with you for a bit alone. I mean, we never really had the chance otherwise."

"All this trouble and all you want to do is talk?"

She looked down the hall to see if they were alone in the hallway. Once her suspicions were confirmed, she glanced at Nick and then quickly ran into her room, grabbing onto Nick's shirt collar and pulling him in with her.

She quickly shut the door and pushed Nick against the wall and began to kiss him passionately as her fingers ran down his chest and began to unbutton his shirt. He raised his hands to her shoulders and pulled off her hooded sweatshirt and threw it aside.

She pulled away from him and smiled as she stared at him.

"Look," He said to her. "You don't have to do this for me."

"I know." She whispered in his ear.

She then began to kiss his neck as she continued to undue his shirt.

He reached his hands up around her waist and held her close as he leaned his head back against the door and smiled.

"I love this goddamn apocalypse!"


	17. And Shoot Us!

17.

…And Shoot Us!

As dawn shined through the windows, the feeling of comfort and safety soothed the survivors as they slept in their rooms. Each room was a light grey color on the walls and the bedding was a deep green, the room gave a cold and empty vibe, but to them it was home.

Zoey slowly opened her eyes as she awoke to the view of sunlight through the windows. She smiled as she breathed calmly and deeply, not worrying about her life or safety, but instead just enjoying a morning for what it was; a day they were given for surviving the night before, a day that they could accomplish whatever they wanted to without worrying about severe consequences to themselves or to those around them. Truly, to them, it was a paradise.

She rolled over toward the other side of the bed to find Nick, still sound asleep.

She stared at him, puzzled for a moment, wondering why he had bothered to stay the night. Sighing at his decision to stay, she stared at him as he continued to lay on his back, sound asleep.

As light continued to illuminate the room, Nick awoke to the sun shining in his eyes and glanced over at Zoey.

"Hey," He said as he looked away from her and stared at the ceiling.

"Hi." She said softly. "I honestly was half expecting you to be gone."

"I don't know where you were expecting me to go." He said. He looked over at her.

"I haven't left yet, so there's nothing for you to worry about."

She smiled. "You're right. I mean, I'm not one to…"

"Don't worry about it." He said with a smile. "It meant the same to the both of us. It's our little secret, and they'll never know."

She smiled. "Thanks. If anything came up about it, there could be way too many problems."

"Tell me about it." He said. "But they won't hear it from me."

"They won't hear me say anything about it either."

"I think they might have already heard…" He said sarcastically.

Suddenly a knock on the door was heard.

Zoey gasped as she quickly looked toward the door in alarm.

"Relax," He said. "If you begin to panic, you'll draw more attention to yourself. Now just get up slowly and it'll be fine."

"If I could have your attention, I need to speak to all of you on a very important matter."

The survivors walked out slowly from their rooms as Lynch stood in the middle of the hallway, counting them as they emerged.

They stared at Lynch curiously as he stood stiff, waiting.

Lynch stared at the door that remained closed. He knocked on the door and got no answer.

"Where's the other one?" He asked.

"Wait, who?" Rochelle asked.

"Hey, where's Nick?" Ellis asked.

"Maybe he got up early." Louis said.

"He needs to be present." Lynch said. "I am to escort all eight of you together."

"It's okay, he's not far." She admitted.

She looked behind her as Nick walked out and stood next to her in the doorway.

Coach gave Nick a look of disappointment while Rochelle's eyes widened.

"Ah." Lynch said when he saw Nick approach. "Well now that I have all of your attention, General Stewart wishes to speak with all of you together about an…important matter. This matter must be discussed immediately and quickly, if you would all please follow me."

"Where are we going?" Francis asked.

Lynch paused, unhappy with where he knew he was leading them.

"To the back lot, where we keep our vehicles. Do not worry, I hope this meeting will be brief, and not put a damper on things to come." He said.

The eight followed Lynch as he led them through the bas and out onto the back lot. Standing right outside to their left against the wall were eight soldiers, armed and standing at attention. Directly in front of the survivors stood General Stewart, facing away from them as he awaited their arrival. The moment he heard Lynch close the door, he turned to face the survivors.

"Good morning." Stewart said. "I have brought you all out here to speak with you on a matter that is most troublesome."

The survivors stared at General Stewart as he began to pace in front of them.

"It seems that there is a disturbing link to those who are infected and to those who might be carriers of the deadly virus…you, to be specific. It seems that wherever you go, a horde of those disgusting and vile creatures tends to follow."

He stopped and stared at them.

"Now why do you suppose that is?"

"Uh, well sir," Ellis spoke up nervously. "I don't think we had anythin' to do with all that…"

"Did I say that you had permission to speak?" He snapped at Ellis.

Ellis fell silent and nervously shook his head.

"They followed you there, I don't know if it's your smell or they just have this special sense for the ones who are carriers of the virus." He took a step closer to the survivors. "But to me, I think it's because they know that no matter where you go, you'll always make more of them. And now I think that poses a threat to me and the entire military." He nodded toward one soldier that stood nearby.

The soldier nodded to the other troops nearby as they drew their guns on the survivors.

"So in order to ensure the safety of the rest of the human race, this problem must be terminated immediately, before more of you spawn and start crawling all over this base."

He turned toward the soldiers that stood behind them.

"Position them for the firing squad." He ordered as he took a step backward from the survivors.

"This is an outrage!" Bill snapped. "You have no authority to do this!"

"No?" He said as his face filled with anger. "I do as I am instructed to by the duty of the United States of America. My main goal is to ensure the safety of my countrymen in any means necessary."

"And just where are we supposed to fit in?" Louis said angrily. "We too are U.S. Citizens, we trusted you!"

"No, you trusted my former commanding officer, he was a fool and deserved his fate; a fate he could have avoided if it wasn't for your corrupted bodies!"

"Bullshit, and you know it!" Bill said. "You have no way to prove that we brought down the zombies onto your platoon, or that we are carriers of this horseshit in any way!"

"Then perhaps before I have you executed, are there any of you who would want to donate your bodies to science?"

"This is bullshit!" Zoey shouted. "Who the hell do you think you are to kill us after all we went through?"

A soldier that stood behind her stepped forward and reached for her arm to restrain her.

"Don't touch me!" She snapped at the soldier.

The soldier made an even stronger effort to hold onto her arms and restrain her when Francis and Nick closed in on him.

"You lay a hand on her and I'll bury you alive." Nick said sternly.

"Why don't you fight someone your own size?" Francis said as he grabbed onto the uniform of the soldier.

Suddenly the two soldiers behind the two gentlemen raised their guns up to their heads in defense of their comrade.

General Stewart saw the struggle and calmly raised his right hand, motioning for the soldiers to back off.

Nick, Zoey, and Francis watched as the soldiers quickly stepped away from them, returning to their original post.

"Well wasn't that a neat trick." Nick said. "Can you teach them to sit, fetch, and roll over too?"

"You may fight and disagree with my reasons all you want." Stewart said. "But hopefully just before the end you will see things from my perspective and understand that what I am doing is for the good of all."

"You stuck up asshole!" Zoey said.

General Stewart walked up to Zoey and stared at her.

"Do you really think that I am a cold hearted man? Think of the lives I will be saving by sacrificing only a few." He reached his hand up toward her face when he was interrupted by Rochelle.

"She's right, you sick mother…" She said. "You have no right to just throw our lives away like an old uniform."

"On the contrary…" He said as he looked at Rochelle. "If I could, I'd spare the women from this horrible fate, but then we would run the risk of you attempting to repopulate the species." He looked back at Zoey. "Though the offer is tempting…" He lowered his hand and turned away from the group. "It cannot be chanced, and therefore leaves me with no other option."

"Sir," Captain Lynch approached Stewart. "Please, maybe we could come up with another course of action…"

"Do not attempt to change my mind, Captain…" He paused for a second, thinking. "I'll tell you what; I will leave you in charge of giving the order that is necessary. If you succeed, then you will have proven yourself to be a valuable asset to this entire operation, _Colonel_."

Lynch paused briefly, processing what the General had said.

"Sir?"

"_Give the order_, _Colonel Lynch_." He commanded.

Lynch looked at the survivors and back at Stewart. His face was filled with conflict as he weighed his options in his mind. Finally, he slowly nodded.

"Yes, sir."

He walked up toward the survivors as Stewart watched Lynch intently.

"Turn them around." Lynch commanded.

The soldiers held up their guns as the survivors turned away from Lynch to face the wall behind them and stood up against it.

"Well, look at this, Coach!" Nick said angrily. "It looks like the military is lining us up against the wall… _and shooting us_!"

"This ain't how it's supposed to end, Nick." Coach replied.

"There's got to be a way out of this," Rochelle said. "There's got to be a way out of this…"

"Take a good look around," Francis said. "They've got eight guys with guns to our heads and one stuffed shirt with a pole up his ass giving orders. How the hell do we get out of this, Mr. Sunshine?"

"It's not over," Louis said. "We're not dead yet. Never give up hope."

"He's right, man! Never give up hope!" Ellis said.

"_What_ hope…?" Nick grumbled.

The soldiers walked about seven feet away from the survivors and lined up with their rifles in their hands.

Col. Lynch stared anxiously at the soldiers as they awaited their orders.

"Ready," He said.

The soldiers raised their rifles.

"Aim…" His voice began to shake.

The soldiers lined up their rifles and aimed for the back of each survivor's head.

Zoey shook as she awaited the final order.

"I never thought I'd die like this…"

Nick glanced over at her. "No shame in accepting defeat."

Lynch shook his head.

"…This is wrong."

"What are you waiting for?" Stewart said. "Give the order!"

Lynch bit his tongue and stood stiff.

"You miserable worthless inbred! I'll have your court marshaled!" He stepped in front of Lynch to give the order.

"Fire!"

"Drop your weapons!"

Only one gunshot was heard.


	18. That Doesn't Sound Human

17.

WATCH YOUR ASS!

The survivors closed their eyes and awaited the one gunshot to be their last sound heard.

As the eight realized they were still alive, they turned to see Col. Lynch standing behind General Stewart, with a gun pointed to his head.

"I apologize for scaring you all with a warning shot." Lynch said to the survivors. "But it was the only way to avert their attention away from you." He stared at Stewart, disgusted.

"You can do your worst to me, but you will let them go." He looked at the soldiers nearby.

"Lay your weapons down in front of you and step away from them slowly, or watch your commanding officer end up splattered all over the ground just like his predecessor."

"You ignorant snake," Stewart sneered. "You're finished, you're dead! Do you hear me?! Do you?!"

"That's enough." He said to Stewart. "Even in danger, all you do is whine and complain. You are not fit to be in charge of this operation. The moment they are released from your grasp, you are relieved of duty, _sir._"

He turned to face the survivors.

"Grab the guns, arm yourselves and get out of here, quick!" He said to them. "It won't be long before someone realizes what has happened, you need to escape before it's too late!"

Bill, Coach, and Louis grabbed the guns off of the ground that were placed by the soldiers.

"Through the door you came in and down the hall to the right is our weapon storage area. Take what you need to escape. In order to get out undetected, you're most likely going to have to shut down the power from the sub-basement. Beware patrolling soldiers in the halls and the security desk next to the gun room."

Bill nodded. "Consider it done."

"In light of your sacrifice for us," Louis said. "We will do everything we can to escape."

"Don't worry about me." Lynch said. "They can do their worst to me, but as long as you get out of here alive, their pain means little to me." He sighed and looked at the survivors, still pressing the gun to the side of Stewart's head.

"Too many good people that I have served with have died by arrogance and ambition. There is nothing left for you here."

The survivors nodded.

"Thank you." Rochelle said softly, holding back tears.

"God bless you, and may he keep you safe from your undeserved consequences." Coach said.

"Thank you." Lynch nodded.

The survivors quickly hurried back into the building and down the long hallway toward their objective.

"We should split up." Louis said. "Gather what we need in groups."

"Agreed." Bill said. "We should split up in different groups to obtain guns, first aid, and to scout out for patrols."

"Sounds like you know exactly what to do." Louis said.

"Infiltrating an enemy base is no easy performance." Bill said.

They stood at a hallway intersection and discussed their options. The plain beige hallways seemed to be empty of personnel for the moment, but time would not stop for those who needed it.

The survivors split up in three different directions. Ellis, Nick, Zoey, and Rochelle split toward the gun room and the security station. While Coach and Francis went after the military patrols down the hallway leading toward the basement and Bill and Louis went after First Aid.

Nick quietly walked down the hallway holding his rifle tightly as he looked for any signs of the military. Behind him was Ellis, gripping his rifle and hugging the wall as if he were pretending to be a super spy in an action movie. He constantly looked forward and backward quickly, hoping to catch any sign of the enemy.

Nick stopped dead when he heard a sound echoing from around the corner as Ellis continued to look behind them down the hallway and backed into Nick, bumping him a bit and making noise as his rifle bumped Nick's.

Nick turned his head toward Ellis after he bumped into him and sighed as he gave him a look. Ellis quickly looked over his shoulder at Nick and lowered his head when he realized he had made the noise.

"..Sorry." He whispered sheepishly.

The two continued to walk cautiously down the hallway until they came upon a door that was marked "Firearms Storage". Nick reached for the knob and giggled it to discover it was locked.

"Shit…" He said. "It's locked."

He grabbed onto the handle with this left hand and pressed his left shoulder onto the door as he put his right hand up onto the door and gave it a strong push. The door did not budge.

"Here, let me give it a shot." Ellis said. He stepped back away from the door and gave it one swift kick. The door swung open and revealed a large collection of different guns lining the walls. Everything from sub-machine guns to sniper rifles and grenade launchers were at their fingertips.

"Hol-ee shit…" Ellis said. "Now _this_ is the best damn thing that could'a happened to us!"

"Keep it down, will you?" Nick said. He stepped away from the door and continued to look down both ways of the hallway. He then looked toward the direction that they had come from and quickly walked toward the end of the hallway until he came upon another door. He looked to see if no one was watching and quickly knocked once on the door. It opened, and Zoey quickly walked out holding a Molotov cocktail.

"Got it." She said as she walked out. "All clear?"

"Should be, if not, you girls are going to be using those explosives a hell of a lot sooner."

"All right, I've got enough pipe bombs to last us for a while." Rochelle said as she walked out the door. "All clear to the gun room?"

"It's clear, Ellis is getting happy over their gun collection so we'd better grab what guns we can and get out."

"I hope we're not interrupting anything." Zoey said as she walked ahead of the other two.

"Hey, I got somethin' for everyone." Ellis said as he held onto three different types of guns.

"We'll take some back with us for the others." Rochelle said as she picked up a couple weapons.

Nick and Zoey both grabbed a Magnum pistol and prepared to continue their escape as Ellis and Rochelle followed closely behind them.

They continued down the hallway until they came to the front security station, where one low rank soldier was watching various monitors that covered different parts of the base.

"I've got this." Zoey whispered to the other three.

She slowly and calmly walked toward the open door of the station and stood in the doorway.

"Hey," She said to the recruit.

"Hi there," The young man said. "You a civilian?"

"Um yeah…of course I am." She said.

"Okay, well I'm not supposed to let anyone in here if they're not the military, so I'm gonna have to ask you to leave."

From outside the station, the three listened in on their conversation.

"Jesus, this guy sounds like Ellis." Nick said.

"I heard that." Ellis said.

"Shh!" Rochelle said.

"Well you don't have to tell your boss that I was here if I don't do any harm, right?" Zoey asked the soldier.

"Well, I suppose not." The soldier smiled. "What can I do for a sweet girl like you anyhow?"

Zoey smiled mischievously and stepped closer to him.

"You could do me a great big favor…"

The soldier's smile grew larger.

"Anything for a pretty young miss like yourself."

Zoey suddenly pulled out her Mangum pistol and pointed it at the soldier's head.

"Get in the closet." She ordered.

"What the hell?" The soldier said.

"Stand up. Get away from the console and nobody gets hurt."

The soldier quickly and clumsily stood up and put his hands up.

"Good work." Nick said as he walked in the room behind her.

"Now if anyone asks, you didn't see us, right?"

The recruit froze.

"The lady asked you a question." Nick said.

The soldier nervously nodded.

"All right c'mon." Ellis said as he walked into the doorway. "What are we waitin' for?"

"We're waiting for the others to be clear of the monitors." Rochelle said as she walked in past Ellis and stood next to Zoey, watching the monitors.

"There!" She pointed to one of the monitors. "There goes Bill and Louis toward the hospital section."

"With any luck, we just might make it out of this hell hole alive." Nick said as he glanced toward the monitor.

The soldier saw as the four watched the monitors and slowly reached his hand toward the base's intercom microphone.

Zoey caught the soldier's movement out of the corner of her eye and quickly looked back at him and held her pistol up again at him.

"Hey! I said don't move!" She said.

"We'd better go." Rochelle said.

"Right behind ya!" Ellis said as he followed Rochelle out of the room.

"He's not going anywhere." Zoey said with a smirk.

"That's my girl." Nick whispered in her ear. He followed Ellis out and turned to face Zoey one more time.

"Don't take too long." He said as he left.

"As soon as you're all clear." She said.

Meanwhile, Coach and Francis were sneaking toward the basement entrance to make sure the coast was clear for the other survivors. As they came up to the door, they spotted two guards talking to each other as they guarded the door.

"I'll take care of them." Francis said.

He quietly stepped down the hallway toward the corner that the door was on the other side of. He had just come into range until he accidentally bumped into a drinking fountain that was sticking out of the wall and made a loud banging sound.

"Ah, shit!" He shouted.

Suddenly the guards were alerted to his presence and pulled their guns on him.

"Hold it right there!" One of them said.

Francis stared at them in anger and quickly looked around for something to use to help him escape.

"Put the rifle down and put your hands up!" The other soldier said.

Francis looked down at the drinking fountain and smirked.

"Fine, come and get me!" He said as he grabbed tightly onto his gun and smashed the barrel into the drinking fountain, causing the fountain to break and water to spray in several different directions all over the hallway.

The soldiers recoiled as the water shot into their faces and slipped on the wet floor. As they fell to the ground, Francis quickly grabbed their guns and shot the lock off the basement door.

"Well this wasn't what I had in mind!" Coach said as he ran up to Francis. "You'd better not plan on killin' nobody while we're gettin' out of here!"

"Or what, fat man, don't kill them like they tried to kill us?"

Coach paused and thought for a moment. "All right, I can understand your frustration, but this ain't over."

"Not until the fat twinkie man sings!" Francis said as he held the basement door closed from the inside.

At the same time, Louis and Bill quickly and quietly got into the hospital section and stole a case of first aid out of one of the storage closets.

"I'll hold onto the first aid." Bill said.

"I'm grabbin' pills." Louis said.

"Grab some adrenaline, it'll help." Bill said.

"Excuse me." Said a nurse as she discovered the two.

"What is going on here?" She asked angrily.

"Ma'am, please." Louis said. "We are not causing any trouble here, we are just grabbing supplies for our next big trip."

"But you're supposed to stay with us! You've all just recovered from your injuries and we haven't been told of your release."

"Look, miss." Bill said. "I hate to do this," He held his rifle up toward her.

She gasped as her eyes widened, staring at the gun.

"Your commanding officer's an asshole!"

"He's just as lethal as these zombies that we've been fighting!" Louis explained. "He tried to order our execution!"

"Execution?" The nurse said in shock. "After all the work they had us do to keep you all healthy they tried to kill you?"

The two nodded.

The nurse looked around to see if anyone else was around.

"…Follow me."

"Thank you so much, ma'am." Louis said.

"To be honest, I never approved of General Stewart's way of handling things." She said as she led them down the hallway of the hospital area. "Ever since General Hildebrandt was killed he's been treating this whole area like he's king and he barely gives anyone else a chance to dispute him since there's no room for dispute due to his huge ego." She stopped in front of a door. "There I go rambling again!" She sighed. "But look, this is an employee emergency exit, there are no soldiers and no cameras, however it doesn't take you anywhere else but the basement."

"That's perfect, ma'am." Louis said.

"That's where we're headed." Bill said.

"Oh good, I wish you guys the best then!" She said. "I won't tell anyone that you were here, they'd probably have me killed if Stewart found out!"

The two nodded and headed through the door down a dark stairwell that led to the basement.

Nick, Rochelle, Ellis and Zoey quickly ran toward the door that Francis opened up for them. Nearby Coach held a gun onto the soldiers that were still on the ground.

"About time you guys showed up." Francis said.

"We got some guns!" Ellis said.

"And explosives." Rochelle said.

"Anyone grab any snacks?" Coach said.

"No Coach that was _your_ job." Nick said sarcastically.

"Let's go!" Rochelle said. "We don't know how much longer we have!"

"Where's Bill?" Ellis asked.

"Down here!" Shouted a voice.

Francis looked down the stairs toward the basement and saw Bill and Louis already downstairs.

Coach looked down one of the hallways and saw a military officer watching from behind a hallway corner.

"They're onto us!" Coach said.

"All right, we got to get movin'!" Nick said.

"Let's go let's go let's go!" Ellis said.

The group all headed down the stairs into the basement and through the first door that led to the maintenance area.

Francis and Ellis pushed a large metallic crate over the door to barricade the military outside.

"What are we looking for?" Rochelle asked.

"Lynch said there was a switch box to we could use to turn off the power with." Louis said.

They looked on all the walls of the small area of the basement. The walls were a dark concrete gray that had dirt and dust covering every corner. A faint smell of must crept its way around the area as they looked past old and broken power conduits and busted weaponry.

Within minutes the survivors had looked over the entire area of the small room and found nothing.

"He tricked us!" Nick shouted. "There's no electoral conduit down here at all!"

"Hey guys," Ellis said. "Where does this door lead?"

"Well, according to Lynch, it leads outside."

"I don't think so…" Bill said. He looked at a sign that said "Authorized Personnel Only"

"What do you think is in there?" Zoey asked.

"Only one way to find out." Louis answered.

Francis kicked the door in and the survivors walked in to see a shocking sight. Aside from the room they had just come in from, the whole basement was turned into a giant lab.

The walls were painted white and military grade lights hung from the ceiling. Along the walls were hung up biohazard suits that looked like they hadn't been cleaned. Various forms of unidentified fluids along with blood were splattered all over them. Near the entrance where the survivors stood were a few rows of autopsy tables with a dead body of an infected individual on each table. One of each special infected had a body that was killed and dissected upon one of the tables.

Small tables were next to each autopsy table that had various medical tools that were covered in blood. On one table was the lower half of a Boomer, all the exposed entrails were pulled out and cut apart. On another table, the throat gland of a Spitter was sliced apart and exposed. The cloth on the table around the wound was burned by the acid.

On the farthest table was a severed arm of a Witch. The whereabouts of the rest of the body was unknown.

Zoey walked toward the table and stared at the arm. She then looked to her right and saw a shelf that had been mounted onto the wall. She walked up to the shelf and saw numerous vials of fluids marked and stored for records. Some vials of blood were labeled "contaminated", while others were labeled with such names as "Boomer Bile" or "Spitter acid."

"Oh god…" Zoey said when she saw it.

"They were experimenting on them." Nick said as he stared at the Witch arm.

"I can't believe the military's putting all their effort into studying these creatures instead of helping us out!" Louis said.

Suddenly they heard strange noises coming from the other side of the room.

They cautiously approached the other half of the room, where large containment areas were built in thick metal and placed side by side and lined the walls on the other half of the room. As the survivors approached, they saw an even more disturbing sight.

All types of the Special Infected were being held in tight containment and storage. All types but the Tank were fully awake and aware of what was happening around them. The Tank however was awake but heavily sedated as a machine constantly pumped an anesthetic into its system as it breathed quickly and was heavily shackled to the wall of the containment field as it was surrounded by think sheets of glass, as were all the other containment units that all the other infected were in. Each infected had its own cage it was trapped in with an electric field that ran on the inside of the unit with thick glass sheets that were on the front and either side of the rectangular container. The back, top, bottom, and the framework of the containers were lined with thick sleek Titanium beams that held the thick protective glass in place. Long deep claw marks were visible on the inside as well as the outside of the tank that the Witch sat in, still crouched in a corner as she cried. Traces of blood could be seen in some of the claw marks on the inside of the cage.

The other Special Infected saw the survivors as they made their way through the lab and attempted to attack, but were then shocked by the electric field.

"Hey what happens to these guys once we cut the power?" Ellis asked.

"I don't know…" Zoey said. "But I don't think we should stick around to find out."

"What about the military?" Rochelle said. "What will they do to them?"

"What we don't know won't hurt us." Nick said.

"No, we can't just leave all these guys crawling around the facility! We'd doom the whole base!"

"The way they doomed us?" Francis said.

"Well what about Lynch?" Coach said. "You think he could fight them off?"

"It doesn't matter, he's not in charge." Rochelle said.

"He could be if the Tank kills his boss." Ellis said.

"This is a big frickin' military base; they should be able to fight off these guys. Shit, we have all this time by _ourselves_." Francis said. "Let them fight."

"He's onto somethin' there." Ellis said.

"All right then, we just hope and pray the military lasts once we find that power grid." Louis said.

"I think I've got it!" Zoey said from a far corner. "Over here!"

She opened up a metal panel and revealed breaker switches that were labeled for each floor and section they corresponded to.

"What should we turn off?"

Louis held a flashlight up to the conduit and studied the switches.

"I don't know guys," Louis said. "I'm not sure which switch the front gate is on."

"Do we hafta flip 'em all?" Ellis asked as he looked nervously at the cases of special infected.

"Yeah, I'm with Ellis." Rochelle said. "I really don't want to release these guys from their cages just yet."

"Well which one?" Nick asked.

"I'm not sure; the front gate isn't labeled specifically. I'd have to flip each individual switch to find out what it did before I knew which one to turn off." Louis said.

"So let's just do this!" Francis said as he raised his shotgun.

"Francis, no!" Louis shouted.

Francis shot the metal conduit and sparks shot out of the box as the whole room grew dim. The only light they had was the glow of their flashlights.

"Francis, you fucktard!" Zoey shouted.

Suddenly loud and disgusting groans were heard behind them. The sounds of the infected clawing and scraping at the glass got louder and louder until they heard the glass begin to crack and shatter.

"Oh shit…" Ellis said. "Shit, run!"

"Run where?!" Rochelle asked.

"Through here!" Bill said as he shined his flashlight on a door that was next to the conduit labeled "Employees Only".

"The nurse showed us an employee entrance earlier, this should be one too."

Ellis kicked the door in and led the survivors as they lit the way up the stairs and toward the upper floor of the base.

Atop the stairs was a door that led outside into the front courtyard of the base.

"There's the gate!" Bill shouted as he pointed toward the large thick metal gate that matched the high metal protective fencing around the base. Barbed wire was looped around the top of the fence, all except the gate.

Coach walked quickly up to the metal gate and swung a fire axe into the center of the gate, attempting to pry it open.

With Francis and Ellis on one side, and Nick and Louis on the other, the four men pulled on either side of the gate until it was open enough to squeeze through.

Behind them the military began to swarm from every door that was closest. As they began to swarm the survivors, they continued to attempt their escape.

"Ladies first!" Ellis shouted with his voice strained from holding the large metal gate open.

"Go go go!" Francis shouted.

Rochelle slipped through the small hole in the gate first while Zoey followed right behind.

"All right, come on, old people next!" Francis said.

"Hey, who you callin'" Coach said.

"Coach, just shut the fuck up and go!" Nick commanded.

The four pulled even harder as Coach struggled to fit through the tight opening in the gate. Bill crawled successfully through right after.

"Go man, you're next!" Francis said to Nick.

He nodded and quickly squeezed through the gate to grab a hold of the other side where Louis was.

"Ellis, you go next!" Louis shouted.

"Gotcha." He said as he quickly slid through the gap and regained his hold of the gate.

Louis looked toward the military as they came even closer.

"What do we do?" He asked Francis. "They're almost right on top of us!"

Suddenly a loud roar was heard as a Tank burst through the employee door that the survivors had emerged from and began to attack the military.

"I told ya they'd kill the goddamn zombies!" Francis said. "Now get your ass through there!"

Louis nodded and made his way through the metal gate. Suddenly the excessive force over time had caused the three men to lose grip on the metal door, causing it to slam shut.

"Francis!" Louis shouted as he stood in front of the gate.

Francis stood on the other side of the gate and grabbed onto his shotgun to face the military.

Suddenly he saw the Tank pick up a piece of rubble and throw it toward Francis.

"Shit! Heads up guys! BACK UP!"

"What did he say?" Louis asked.

"He said back up…" Nick said, realizing what was said. "BACK UP!" He shouted as he motioned for everyone to move away from the door.

Suddenly a piece of rubble flew at Francis as he dodged it just in time to watch the rubble wreck a large hole in the gate.

Francis casually stepped through the large hole with his shotgun over his shoulder and a smirk.

"I told you guys it'd end up like this."

"What do we do now?" Zoey asked.

"We keep running." Bill said. "We keep running until we know the military is a safe place again."

"Great," Nick said sarcastically. "We're back out in freakin' _zombie land_!"


	19. Not Dead Yet!

"It seems like we've been running away from our past, present, and future longer than we have even been a part of it. The days become harder and harder to keep track of as we're still trying to make our way through man's greatest battle.

Our wounds have healed, but the stabs in our hearts from the very people we all but our faith and trust into is gonna be a hard wound for us to close. Their pursuits didn't last long once they were reminded of the real threat at hand; unfortunately we haven't seen or heard anything of them since.

I keep thinking of that phrase that Coach always says in times of struggle, "If you're still a prayin' man, then pray harder." In times like these, I wonder if there is even enough prayer left in this world to keep us going for as long as we can hold out.

Sometimes I think we're stuck in some crazy, mixed up nightmare, and that we might never wake up to find out it's all over. But I won't let that thought get me down, I've got a hunch that we'll be able to pull through all of this no matter what!"

"Hey Louie," Francis said. "You gotta wake up, you're sleeping to long again. Get up, you're gonna miss out on some good old-fashioned fun!"

Louis nodded as he looked around the room as the other survivors woke up and began to grab onto their guns and prepare for the long journey ahead. He glanced at his pistol stuck into the holster on the side of his leg and slowly sat up.

"I'll be okay." He said happily. "This fight ain't over yet!" He said as he stood up from the cold floor.

The survivors began to wake up and prepare for survival in the back room of an abandoned ranch style home. The walls were lined with dark wooden paneling, covered with dirt from age and the traffic of past survivors stocking up and resting briefly. In some places the paneling had either fallen off or had been torn off, exposing a light gray shade of drywall, crumbled in a few sections. The only window was on the far wall of the room, which was heavily boarded up and had metal bars to reinforce the barricade. The back door toward the rest of the house had a beaten up white painted metal dryer turned onto its side and slid up against the bottom of the door while an old and worn faded yellow chair lay across its top. Toward the left corner of the room stood the back door of the house leading outside, with an old metal foldout table piled high with first aid kits on the same wall while the adjacent wall had a matching table and a wide variety of guns spread across the top of it.

"I got your six." Bill said as he reloaded his M-16 Machine Gun.

"Hey, y'all wanna pass me that purdy little shotgun right there?" Ellis said.

"What, this one?" Nick said as he reached onto the table and picked up an auto-shotgun.

"Yeah, that's her." Ellis nodded with a smile.

Nick handed the shotgun toward Ellis.

"Think fast!" He said as he let go of the shotgun just as Ellis reached for it, causing it to fall out of his hands and onto the floor.

"Ha ha, very funny Nick." Ellis said as he bent down to pick up his gun.

"That's enough horsing around," Bill said. "These guns are all we've got left to save us."

"Yeah, we can't afford to smash 'em!" Francis said angrily at Nick.

"Don't worry about me." Rochelle said. "I am taking real good care of this gun. I love this thing." She said as she smiled.

"Ah, bullshit." Francis said. "Nothin' beats a classic shotgun."

"Amen to that, brother." Ellis said.

Nick looked to his left at Zoey as she reached over to grab a submachine gun to replace her AK-47.

"Best gun ever made. Your'e leaving that behind?" Nick asked.

Zoey extended her hand holding the rifle above the table and slammed it angrily down onto the table. She gave Nick an evil look as she stepped away from the group and walked toward the table that had a stack of first aid kits.

"Still mad…" Nick carelessly shrugged as he reached for ammunition off of the gun table.

"This shit's gettin' old." Bill said as he took a puff of his cigarette and stared out the open gaps between the cold steel bars that lined the safe room door.

"Amen to that, brother." Coach said as he walked up next to him. "Just when it seems that you got somethin' good goin', along comes something bad to mess this whole shit up."

Bill sighed. "Sometimes I wonder if it's all worth fighting for in the end."

"Don't let the bad stuff get you down." Coach said with a smile. "With a little bit of faith and trust, we're gonna get through this."

"I hope you're right." Bill said solemnly.

"This is the worst town I've ever been in." Nick said.

"Worse than New Orleans?" Ellis asked.

"Yes, this is much worse than New Orleans." Nick said angrily.

"Shut the hell up, crybaby." Said Francis. "Why don't you go and cry yourself over to the door and cry your way to death in the zombies?"

"You know what, you greasy vest wearing…"

"All right, all right, that's enough of that you two." Rochelle said. "We just gotta keep motivated, and we'll be all right with no fighting for once. Does that sound good?"

"For you? I can keep motivated." Francis said.

Rochelle smiled. "Good, at least somebody listens."

"We better start moving." Bill said as he loosened the metal rod from the safe room door. "We're burning daylight."

"Here we go." Zoey said.

She opened the safe room door and drew her double pistols as the rest of the survivors stepped out with their guns drawn.

Before them lay the morning sun, tracing the broken down houses on the block before them in the endless piles of rubble scattered across the plain that was once called a town.

One house stood partially intact, only having one half of it caved in, including the roof, where others were ruined to the point of being nothing but an empty lot with a few scattered broken bricks of concrete from the foundation. One home seemed like it had survived the apocalypse despite a corpse hanging halfway out of one of the broken windows, only to have it be known with a second glance that its entire internal structure was knocked apart with a large hole in the back of the house, most likely ruined by an intruding Tank.

In between the houses, a short, but unsteady and wild growing patch of grass lined the desolate ruins, indicating that it had been quite some time since any human beings had lived in the town.

As the survivors continued down the nearby street, weaving past abandoned cars and through collapsed walls of houses, they saw as the infected continued to swarm in small numbers amongst themselves erratically across the town.

Atop one ruined house was a corpse that lay sprawled across the wreckage of a rooftop with a sign leaning on his lap that read, "Repent, the end has come."

Coach paused to stare at the sign.

"Shame he didn't make it." He said.

Suddenly from behind the corpse, a Hunter leapt out and pounced on Coach, instantly clawing into his chest.

Ellis turned to see Coach pinned and quickly ran to shoot the Hunter when suddenly from atop a ruined building a Smoker ensnared him and pulled him far away from Coach.

"Aah! Smoker's got me!" He shouted, his voice weakening from the strangulation.

"Hang on!" Francis shouted as he turned toward Ellis and fired his shotgun up at the Smoker. As he paused to reload, a Boomer stepped out from behind an abandoned truck and threw up on Francis, Bill, Nick, and Rochelle.

"Shit!" Nick shouted as he wiped his face, struggling to see through the thick green bile.

"I'm coming!" Zoey shouted as she fired her gun at the Hunter that still had Coach pinned. The Hunter screeched and slumped over as it died alongside Coach.

"Shit, I'm down!" Coach shouted, watching the body of the Hunter slide away from him and bleed out next to him, his claws on his hands exposed.

"Don't worry, I got you." Zoey said as she ran over to help Coach up.

While still on the ground, Caoch looked over at Ellis, who was still constricted, and fired his pistol up at the Smoker's tongue, releasing Ellis from its grasp, giving him the chance to kill it himself.

Meanwhile, Louis and Rochelle attempted to fend off the horde when a Jockey leapt onto Rochelle's face, steering her into the horde.

"Hang on, I got you!" Louis shouted. He followed the Jockey into the horde and shoved the infected away from her. He then shot the Jockey off of Rochelle's head, and continued to shoot it until it finally died amongst the bodies of the now deteriorating horde.

Long after the special infected were killed and the boomer bile had worn off, the last of the horde had died down, and the survivors had a chance to catch their breath.

"Damn," Coach said. "They beat my ass." He put a hand to his stomach and watched as he slowly bled out of his open wounds.

"Here, I got it." Nick said. "Now don't waste this getting pounced on again, okay?"

"Thanks." He said as Nick used his first aid kit to patch him up. "I owe you one."

"Yeah, pay me back later." Nick said as he reached for his gun.

"You okay?" Francis asked Rochelle.

She nodded to him and smiled. "Oh yeah, I'm fine. They didn't get me."

"Good." Francis said. "Can't afford to have another man down."

"Oh don't worry," She said. "You won't get me down that easy."

Francis smirked. "Don't be too sure about that."

"Everyone okay?" Louis asked.

"I'm fine." Zoey said.

"How about Ellis?"

"Yeah I'm all right, just gonna take the last of these pills.

As they continued through the wrecked neighborhoods, the spaces between the houses seemed to grow slightly farther apart, hinting at the possibility of them reaching the edge of the town.

They came up to a house that seemed somewhat intact, aside from trash scattered across the floor of it. Only a few walls were torn apart or even damaged, aside from the occasional torn wallpaper or blood smeared across the painted walls and nearby floors. Just beyond the front door was the living room of the house, with an old worn dark blue couch and a broken television set sitting nearby the door, as if they were used to barricade, but were unsuccessful. The carpeting was a light brown, stained with blood pools of various sprays and sizes, mostly around the front door and nearby windows.

As the survivors entered, they scouted through the wrecked pieces of furniture and beaten up walls for supplies.

Nick and Zoey both approached a wall in the living room that had a message written on it:

"Belle,

While you were out looking for supplies I went ahead and took the last evac out of town. Will find a way to send back help when I can. Hang in there until I come back for you.

You husband,

Eddie"

"Sounds like a hell of a weird marriage." Nick said.

"Sounds like grounds for divorce." Zoey said.

Nick paused and stared at her.

"You said something to me."

She bit her lip in defeat and quickly turned away.

"I got you to talk to me." He said triumphantly.

She shook her head and began to walk past the other survivors as they continued to talk.

"We gotta keep moving." Bill said. "We're spending too much time in one place."

"They'll find us soon enough." Louis agreed.

"Not if we try to get outta here by dark." Ellis said.

"Maybe there's somethin' good in here." Coach said as he opened up the kitchen refrigerator.

"I highly doubt there's anything good in there." Rochelle said. "At least nothing we can use."

Zoey approached the fridge and stared into it.

"Well… we could always throw these rotten heads of cabbage at the zombies." She said with a smirk.

"What the hell good is _that_ gonna be?" Francis asked.

Zoey shrugged. "Anything can be a weapon."

"So now you're _not_ talking to me?" Nick asked her.

"Someone want to tell the stuffed shirt to get off my back?" Zoey said.

"That's _enough_, people!" Bill said angrily. "You can bicker all you want when we're rescued but right now we all have a job to do and that's to get the hell out of here, it's going to be dark in a few hours and we haven't found a safe place to stay for the night!"

Zoey lowered her head in guilt.

"…Sorry, Bill."

He turned away sharply and continued to search the house for supplies.

"Spread out, might be somethin' we can use." Coach said.

Louis searched the house's bathroom for supplies. The walls were painted a pale yellow, and the small enclosed space held just enough room for a toilet on the opposite wall of the door, a small sink to the left, and a bathtub directly to the right of the door; all of which were an eggshell white, possibly darkened by age, and furnished with a fine gold trim. Flecks of blood outlined the sink's drain.

"Grabbin' pills." He said as he picked up a bottle of pills left sitting on the side of the sink.

"Anyone else find anything?" Bill asked.

"Nothing here." Zoey said.

"Then we keep moving." Bill said.

Early evening had begun to fall upon the survivors as they neared what seemed to be near the edge of town. Spray paint marks indicating a safe house near an apartment complex helped guide the way.

The apartment complex had many broken windows and walls had sections missing. Wallpaper was torn off of the walls and rubble and dirt covered the torn hardwood flooring and carpeting.

The bottom floor was lined with three apartment buildings on each side, average sized with one or two bedrooms at most. Toward the left side of the complex was a set of stairs that went up to the upper floors. Most of the walls around them were crumbled or smashed completely down, leaving only the perimeter standing. There was only one other door to the complex on the other side of the lower floor, only to be blocked by a large piece of the building's roof and upper floor that had caved in onto it. Through a nearby window what was left of the fallen fire escape lay across the other side of the door, completely sealing it off.

As the survivors went up the stairs toward the upper floor, they saw that the upper floors were more intact, only a few minor holes between walls and very few bodies remained.

"What the hell is this?" Bill asked as he approached the outer wall of the complex where someone had wired blocks of C4 and stuck them to the outer wall, running the connecting wires through holes in the nearby walls.

"This whole place is set to blow at any time." Bill said.

Louis stared at the wires and followed them along the far wall all the way to the apartment on the far left, where against the same wall was a beat up desk and a laptop sitting atop it. All the plugs traced toward a single plug that was attached to the laptop's power cord.

"Hey, wait a minute." Louis said. "The switch was set on an encrypted lock on this laptop computer."

"Great…bombs made by nerds." Nick said.

"If we blow this place, we can get out of this town and take those carnivorous bastards with it." Bill said.

"If only we had some way to power it, I just might be able to hack my way into getting the passcode to blow this whole thing up!" Louis said as he pulled a beat up wooden chair up to the desk and sat down, facing the laptop.

"Yeah, now we're talkin' good news!" Coach said.

"So what do we power it with?"

"There's a generator downstairs, we passed it on the way in." Rochelle said. "I have a feeling that we could use that power to get a little bit of life in that computer with the right hookups."

"Please don't tell me we're going to have to put gas in it…" Nick groaned.

"We might not." Rochelle said.

"Hey guys, I think I found something that'll help." Zoey said. "Look how the wiring is hooked up to run on the laptop's signal. If we can find a way to power it up using similar wiring…"

"Well why can't we just cut the wires?" Ellis asked.

"And risk blowing this whole compound to smithereens?" Bill said sarcastically.

"Maybe not cut it, but cross certain wires…" Zoey said, still knelt in front of the wiring.

"We'll have to take a look." Louis said. "We can't risk crossing the wrong wires either."

"Wait a second!" Zoey said as she traced the lines of cords from the closest set of explosives toward the laptop. "This here," She said as she pointed to a plug, "This is the end of the laptop's power cord. If we can unplug it and maybe run an extension cord from it down the generator and get just enough battery life to hit the switch at a certain time, we just might be able to get out of here!"

"But what if unplugging it causes the dynamite to explode?" Rochelle asked.

"It can't without power, it'll be just a broken circuit." Louis said with realization. "Zoey, you're a genius!"

"Barely," She said as she stood up. "The genius is going to be you once you get that laptop switch to go off."

"Well in that case," Louis said with a smile. "The best is yet to come."

"Francis and I will see what we can do to power the generator."

"Ellis and I will go find a long enough extension cord." Zoey said.

"Ellis?" Nick asked.

"Sounds like a plan," Coach said. "And I'll sit here and watch to make sure the whole thing doesn't blow up."

Rochelle smiled. "Great. Now let's go." She said as she began to head back toward the stairs.

"Hold your horses!" Francis said. "Can't go fast all the time!" He said as he followed her down the stairs.

"Did anyone else notice that those two have been spending a lot of time together lately?"

"It's what they enjoy." Louis said. "If they like spending time together, then there's no shame in letting them have it. You of all people should understand the importance of quality time."

"Yeah, whatever." Nick said. "Weren't you and her hittin' it off not too long ago?"

Louis chuckled. "We have a tight friendly bond. Whatever came of it otherwise wasn't something we wanted, and we're happy with it."

"So you're not jealous or anything?" Nick questioned.

"You've always been a nice, caring, and forgiving kind of guy, Louis." Zoey said, kneeling in front of the wires once again. "You're not vindictive, selfish, and you don't get jealous easy."

"Oh, that's real mature." Nick said sarcastically.

"Hey, I'm not getting in the middle of any of this. So let's try to function as a team."

"Sorry…" Zoey said. She reached forward and grabbed onto a large connected plug. "All right, I'm unplugging it!" She shouted.

"Let's get this over with!" Bill shouted.

Zoey pulled the laptop power plug from the extension cord it was plugged very slowly, hoping she was not making a mistake. As the plug loosened and came undone. She sighed heavily with relief and smiled. She turned to Louis and held the plug up.

"Now all we need is something to run power through it."

"I think I found somethin' over here." Ellis said from the nearby bedroom. "It looks like just a plain old orange cord to me."

"That's perfect!" Zoey said. "Hopefully it'll reach down the stairs."

Ellis came back into the living room holding an irregularly coiled thick orange extension cord and walked over to Zoey with it as she stood up from the lines.

"Will this work?" He asked.

"It'll do just fine." Zoey said with a smile. "Thanks."

She walked over toward the laptop's power plug and plugged one end of the extension cord into the power cord.

"How long does it reach?" Zoey asked.

"Uh, let's see here." Ellis said as he began to uncoil the cord and pull it toward the front door by the stairs.

"I think we'll make it." He said as he continued to walk backwards and uncoil the cord and approach the stairs.

"Hey, be careful you don't fall down the stairs, Ellis!" Louis shouted.

"The what?" Ellis asked as he stepped backward, only to find there was no flooring where he had stepped.

Suddenly, his weight shifted backwards causing him to lose balance and fall toward the stairwell, only to grab onto the railing halfway down, with the force causing him to swing toward the railing and smack flat against it.

"…I'm okay…" He said with relief.

Nick just sighed and rubbed over his eyes with his hand.

"How far does it run?" Zoey asked, trying not to laugh.

"Well if I throw it beneath the railing it'll have enough to reach the bottom floor. I found out on accident, actually!"

"Either way, bring the plug down to Francis and Rochelle. Tell them to plug it into an outlet on the generator if there is one." She said.

"Okay." Ellis said as he put his arms out and gingerly stepped down each stair, being overcautious of falling again.

"Just a little more," Rochelle said. "Then that should be enough gas to let this thing run."

"Been putting in enough cans for it." Francis grumbled.

"It's all right, your hard work will save us all." Rochelle said with a smile. "You're happy to help, I know it."

"Never hurts." Francis said with a smirk at Rochelle.

She smiled.

"Hey guys," Ellis said. "We got the cord, but it only goes as far as the doorway here, you guys got the generator ready?"

"Yeah, it's all fueled up." Rochelle said.

"Here, we'll wheel it out to you." Francis said. He got behind the generator and gently pushed it toward the front door.

"This is gonna be awesome." Ellis said to Francis and Rochelle as they approached with the generator.

"The plug's right over here." Rochelle said as she pointed to a small area with two plugs on it for extension cords.

"All _right_, we are gooood!" Ellis shouted toward the upstairs.

"Great!" Louis shouted happily. "Now let's get this piece of technology the power it needs.

"I'm starting it up!" Rochelle shouted as she started the generator up.

The generator began to run and immediately sent power toward the laptop, causing the battery to begin to charge.

Outside, the sound of the generator running alerted the horde, causing them to shout their all too familiar screams.

"It never ends." Bill muttered as he looked out one of the broken apartment windows.

"Not for us or any human on this earth." Coach said. "Time to give some payback!"

"Lock and load." Bill said.

Nick looked out the window and saw a large horde flood the open highways toward the building.

"Oh, shit!" He said. "These bastards are everywhere, and closing fast!"

"Then we'd better find us some extra firepower!" Ellis said.

"Come on, Louis." Zoey said. You have to hurry up and figure out that code!"

"I'm going as fast as I can." Louis said. "It just needs enough juice to power on, once it does that I can use the power from the generator to keep it on while I get the code ready."

"Great! Get the battery charged, get the code…"

"Then get the hell out of here!" Nick said as he began firing out the window at the horde below.

"Right." Louis said. "The sooner this powers up, the better!"

Ellis he kicked down the door to a locked closet and stared into it with a look of glee.

"Would you look at that!" He said with a smile. "There's enough stuff here to blow all 'em zombies to kingdom come!" He walked into the closet and opened a box nearby filled with pipe bombs and Molotov cocktails.

"Let's burn some shit UP!" He said.

"Hey, pass one over here!" Zoey shouted.

"Take it!" Ellis shouted as he threw her a pipe bomb.

Below, Rochelle and Francis watched through the cracked windows the horde as it flooded toward them.

"What do we do?" Rochelle asked, panicking. "Do we stay, or do we run?"

"I don't know, what do you think?" Francis asked.

Suddenly the screams of a Hunter were heard nearby.

"I think we should run!" Rochelle said quickly.

"Right behind ya." Francis said as he reloaded his shotgun.

The Hunter crept around the corner, carefully crouched and stalking his prey. As it saw Rochelle begin to move, it lunged toward her, only to be shot in the side by Francis, knocking it aside. It tumbled down and landed on its side, immobile for the time being.

Rochelle ran until she heard the gun shot from behind her. She stopped suddenly and whirled around in fear.

"Run!" Francis shouted. "I got this bastard."

"What about you?" She exclaimed.

"I'm right behind ya." He said calmly.

He walked up to the Hunter as it writhed and scrambled to regain its stance to take on its new prey. Francis put his leg atop its chest and aimed his shotgun barrel straight into the bloody, fang-lined mouth of the Hunter. He stared at it in pure vengeance and stared as he fired a single shot into the Hunter's head without even flinching.

He looked up to see Rochelle hurrying up the stairs just as the rest of the zombies began to invade the lower floor. He quickly ran for the stairs, using the railing to pull himself up quickly, avoiding the first few stairs at the bottom and the possibility of a few less clawing hands.

"Come on, you can do it. This thing's got to load!" Louis said as he continued to press keys on the laptop.

"Could you like, load the thing _and_ shoot?" Nick said sarcastically.

"I suppose I'll do what I can, but I gotta watch it to see how well it loads, this way the moment I can use it I don't wanna waste any time fighting a battle that may never end instead of finding us a way out."

"What's the verdict?" Francis said as he and Rochelle came up the stairs.

"The battery hasn't charged enough to boot yet," Louis said. "But hopefully with a little luck it'll happen before these guys get the better of us."

"A little luck, and a little prayer." Rochelle said.

In the other room, Bill and Coach continued to shoot toward the oncoming horde, when they heard a discouraging and fearful roar of a Tank.

"Time to group up!" Coach said.

"You go with them, I'll keep an eye on our largest threat."

"I'll watch your back." Coach nodded as he left.

Coach walked into the room with the rest of the survivors and began to shoot the zombies that came up the stairs along with Francis, Rochelle, and Zoey while Ellis and Nick with an occasional bit of help from Louis continued to shoot through the broken windows at the horde below. Zoey reached into her pocket and threw her pipe bomb through the doorway and watched it as it rolled down the stairs, attracting any zombie that traveled toward the survivors.

"Watch out, we've got a Tank coming!" Bill shouted as he walked into the room with them.

"Oh, shit! Shit, shit, shit!" Ellis replied with fear. He began to walk backwards into the gun closet when he tripped and fell backwards into the back of the closet. He quickly looked over to see what he had tripped on and his eyes lit up with excitement.

"Oh my God, it's Christmas!" He shouted. "I found an M60!" He shouted as he picked up the large gun and held tightly as he walked out of the closet to join the rest of the survivors.

"Jesus Christ!" Nick shouted when he saw what Ellis had carried out of the closet. "Watch where you point that thing!"

"You better know how to fire that thing!" Bill said.

"Oh, man! I ain't afraid of nothin' now! Where's that Tank?"

Just then the roaring from around the corner of the front door answered his terrifying question.

"I'm gonna tear that big guy to shreds!" He shouted.

The Tank burst through the door and began to chase after the survivors.

"TANK!" Francis shouted.

"Shoot him in the head!" Bill commanded.

"Don't let go of the trigger!" Nick said.

"Don't let him destroy any of the equipment!" Louis said.

The rest of the survivors shot the Tank's body while Ellis shot the M60 straight for its head.

The Tank would become enraged with their actions and begin to swing his meaty arms at them when a shot to his face would cause him to stumble and be disoriented for a short time.

Finally, the Tank fell forward and collapsed in front of the survivors, roaring its last breath in defeat as it died. Ellis sighed with relief as he picked up his shotgun and dropped the M60 on the ground, smoke still rising up from its barrel.

"Yes! Tankbusters!" Zoey said triumphantly. "Heh, good luck having that happen again."

Suddenly a short, mechanical beep came from behind them.

"The laptop!" Louis said. "It worked! I can't believe it, it actually worked!"

He ran to the laptop and checked the battery capacity.

"I've got one quarter of a battery," He said. "I better make this quick!"

"Go to town, computer man." Francis said.

Another scream of the horde echoed through the room as the survivors reloaded their guns and reached for explosives while Louis began to run a program that was loaded onto the laptop.

"All right, I just need a little bit of time to switch the generator plug, and to get the program for the bomb up and running!"

"Don't worry, we've got you covered." Coach said.

Louis quickly unplugged the generator's cord from the laptop and plugged in the laptop cord into the plug attached to the explosives. He then quickly sat back down onto the computer and began to type quickly.

As the survivors continued to fight the horde as they came through the door, a single Smoker walked along the building edge, quietly, carefully, and viciously aligned itself with one of the windows and shot its tongue out into the crowd, ensnaring Zoey in its grasp.

"No!" She shouted in a panic. "Help!" She said as she managed to get stuck on the corner of the desk, inches away from the Smoker's claws.

Louis grabbed onto his sub-machine gun to fire on the Smoker, only to have the chamber click in his hand.

"Dammit!" He said, "I can't help her, I'm out of ammo!"

"I gotcha!" Coach shouted as he turned to shoot the Smoker, only to be pounced by a Hunter once again.

"Coach!" Ellis shouted as he knocked the Hunter off of him and killed it with his shotgun.

Nick turned around toward the Smoker and shot him once in the face, causing him to explode his green nauseous gas into the room and releasing Zoey as well.

"You all right?" He asked her as she slowly stood up.

She glanced at him, then back toward her shotgun as she reloaded.

"How's it coming?" Bill asked Louis. "We're starting to run out of bullets here!"

"I know, I know!" Louis shouted in a panic. "Just give me a few minutes!"

"We don't have a few minutes!" Bill shouted.

"What in the name of…" Louis said. "What kind of activation code is this?"

"What is it?" Zoey asked.

"The man who invented it doesn't want it, the man who bought it doesn't need it, and the man who needs it doesn't know it." Louis read. "That's what it says here, with a blank for the activation code."

"What the hell does that mean?!" Nick said.

"A brain teaser?" Rochelle asked.

"This is one hell of a messed up program." Louis said.

"What is he talkin' about, like a gun or somethin'?" Ellis asked.

"Maybe he's talking about a bullet through his head." Nick added.

"Wait!" Zoey shouted. "That's it!" She said in realization. "It's a coffin."

"A what?!" Rochelle asked in disbelief.

"I don't know, just try it!" Zoey shouted to Louis.

"All right, here goes." He said.

He began to type out the response below the riddle question in the interface. Suddenly the border around the laptop screen turned green and began flashing, and a timer popped up in the middle of the screen, showing a digital timer counting down from one minute.

"Oh, shit!" Louis shouted. "Everyone out, RIGHT NOW!" He quickly stood up and began to push Zoey in the direction of the door. "We've got only one minute before this whole thing blows us all up!"

"God dammit!" Bill shouted. "All right, let's go people! Let's move, MOVE!" He shouted as he motioned for the survivors to quickly run down the stairs and out of the building.

As Ellis, Zoey, and finally Louis exited the building, Bill glanced over at the timer to see it only having thirty-two seconds left before detonation.

"Bill, come on!" Louis shouted from atop the stairs.

Bill nodded and continued to follow the survivors out of the building and as far away as they could.

Just as they escaped out of a back path that was now cleared from the infected, a single Hunter managed to wait for them on the other side, hoping to catch them the moment they felt safe.

As Ellis walked out of the door first, he turned to his right just in time to see the Hunter land on him and begin to tear up his chest.

"Whoa, shit!" Nick shouted as he quickly grabbed onto his machine gun and knocked the Hunter off of a bloodied Ellis.

"You okay?" He asked.

"Watch out!" Ellis shouted as he stood up quickly.

The same Hunter leapt toward Nick and pinned him down as well, but not for long until Ellis shot it in the head, returning the favor.

The survivors managed to get a distance of about fifty feet between them and the building as they watched the inside of it explode and fire and smoke shot through the windows, breaking any remaining glass and the entire upper floor had the center of it break apart and scatter brick, drywall and ash all around the area as the lower floor collapsed below it. As the rubble tumbled outward and the smoke and flames rose higher and higher, the remains of the building fell into and damaged the ones near it and completely sealed off the end of the town from where they were. Not a single infected managed to make it out of the blast to the other side.

The survivors just stood silently in awe over what had almost been their lives.

"Everyone all right?" Bill asked to break the silence.

"I'm a little banged up." Rochelle said.

"I'm feelin' a bit under the weather." Coach said. "That Hunter must've torn me up pretty bad."

"I'm feelin' like I've been beaten somethin' awful." Ellis said. "But I'm all right, just gotta sleep it off or somethin'."

"I'm feeling all right," Zoey said. "Just a little winded, but I'm not bleeding."

"Well that's good," Louis said. "It's really good to know that we all made it out alive and nobody got seriously injured."

"Well we've got to find that safe house before we start celebrating." Bill said.

"It shouldn't be far down the road." Louis said. "If we keep walkin' we're sure to find it!"

Sure enough, within fifteen minutes of walking down the road, off to the side was a ranch-style house with heavily boarded up windows with the safe room logo spray painted in front of it.

"See that? We made it!" Rochelle said as they approached.

The survivors quickly ran into the safe room and closed and heavily barricaded the door with tattered furniture.

"Damn, they beat me up good." Coach said as he sat down on one of the chairs. Nearby, the rest of the survivors sat on a couple salvaged couches and rested their injuries.

As Coach wrapped his knee up with his first aid, Nick sat on the edge of a table and gently rubbed his hand over the three distinct claw marks that extended from the bottom of his neck on his right to middle of his chest. He pulled his hand away and stared at the blood that coated his fingers.

"Oh, god dammit." He whispered sarcastically to himself.

"Aw, man." Ellis said as he wrapped a bandage around his leg. "I was sure that Tank was gonna smash right through every single one of us, man. The way he just ran in and kept punchin' we woulda' all been screwed."

"Good thing I kept him busy with my shotgun." Francis said.

"Ohh man, firin' that M60 at its face felt goooood! Woo! Man, it felt great to get some real firepower in these ol' hands spreadin' around and doin' cold hard justice…know what I mean? "

"A guy with steady aim and good use of a gun is always a welcomed ally." Bill said as he used the remainder of his first aid kit to cover up a scratch on his arm.

"I think we're all getting better at it." Louis said. "It's a terrible way to practice, but I think we've all become the best we can be at defending ourselves and protecting one another. This has turned into a fine team, and I wouldn't want to see it any other way."

"Amen to that!" Coach said. "Now it's time to patch up and relax."

Zoey stood holding onto her first aid kit as she watched the other survivors heal themselves and nurse their wounds back to health. She saw as everyone but Nick had first aid that they used to keep themselves in good shape, while Nick pulled on his shirt to cover up the scratch marks and tilted his head to stretch his neck muscles. He began to roll his shoulders forward and winced slightly as his movement agitated the scratches on his chest, causing him to stop moving his shoulders.

She squeezed the first aid kit as she turned away from him and considered keeping it for herself, when she looked back at him once more as he studied the blood on his hands and bit her lip.

He continued to stare at the blood on his hands when she approached him, holding tightly onto her first aid kit.

"Hey…" She said quietly.

Nick looked up at her as she spoke; annoyed.

"…Why don't you let me take care of that…" She said.

He stared at her blankly.

"You think it'll help?" He said.

She nodded.

He hesitated, but decided to push aside his shirt, exposing the scratches. He turned his head and faced away from her as she began to stare at the wounds.

"Wow…" She said quietly as she saw how deep the scratches ran. "These look pretty bad…I'll see what I can do." She began to open the first aid kit and apply a bandage across Nick's chest over the scratches. While she applied the bandage, she accidentally put too much pressure over one section of the wound.

"Hey, take it easy!" He said as he faced her.

She stopped and stared at him, a look of guilt spread across her face. She looked at the wound, then back at him.

"Sorry..." She said.

"It's all right, it doesn't hurt…"

"No…" She sighed. "I'm sorry I've been ignoring you."

"It's fine…" He said softly.

"When I said women were fast and easy, that was before all this."

"So you weren't like that with every girl you've been with?" She asked as she continued to stick the bandage over the rest of the scratches.

"Yeah I was, before the whole world went to pot." He said. "But there aren't a whole lot of people left, so I figured I might as well make it count."

She smiled as she finished patching up his scratches.

"Well I'm glad you stuck around." She said with a smile.

He stared at her for a moment.

"…Me too."


	20. Back In Black

Sunlight shined overhead as the clouds cleared away a beautiful, clear afternoon. As the rays poured through the cracked windows and homes below, it blinded the nearby wandering zombies as one by one their bodies were blown apart from bullets and baseball bats until it came time for the survivors to rest in another safe room.

A small home was heavily barricaded with wooden panels on all the windows and doors aside from the main safe room door. The survivors were inside in deep conversation while Bill studied a map he had stuffed away in his pocket.

"Beer!" Shouted Ellis. "That's what I'd do anythin' for right about now."

"Forget beer," Francis said. "Whatever happened to straight up Jack Daniel's? Now _that's_ a worthy drink."

"What about champagne?" Nick said. "Perfect for the best and wealthiest occasions."

"Wussies drink champagne." Francis said.

"I would give my right hand for a cold one right 'bout now." Ellis said.

"I sure could go for an iced tea." Rochelle said.

"I wish we still had some of that cola we found not too long ago." Zoey said.

"Please, don't mention cola." Nick said, remembering past events.

"You guys better stop all that talk," Louis said. "Just listening to you is making me hungry."

"Now food is somethin' I'd love to have right now." Coach said.

"Jesus, we just ate!" Francis exclaimed. "Maybe you should lay off the snacks for a while."

"Everyone's metabolism's different." Coach replied.

"So is everyone's pants size." Nick said.

"Hey Bill," Francis said as he walked up to him. "Fat Albert wants to eat again."

"We won't have much time to stop and rest as we did earlier." Bill said.

"It'd be so awesome if we found another creek like before." Ellis said as he rubbed his stomach with his hand. "I don't think I ever had as much fun as we did earlier. Fishin' and eatin' the tastiest fish mother nature could offer."

"You've never tried caviar before." Nick said.

"Gross." Zoey said.

"I have an announcement to make." Bill said as he approached the group.

"Well let's hear it." Francis said.

"Yeah," Zoey said. "Well, as long as it's not bad news."

"Either way, news can be good news." Louis said. "Besides, I think Bill's been up to something big lately."

"Well go ahead, old man." Francis said.

"Well, here goes." Bill began. "You all have probably been wondering why we're heading back south, away from the military base in Baton Rouge and once again toward the coast." Bill said.

"Yeah, what gives?" Francis said. "With all this running in circles, I'm startin' to get dizzy here, old man."

"Well you don't have to worry about it anymore, I've been coming up with a plan for how we're gonna get to safety."

"See? I knew he had an idea in his head." Louis said. "I tried to tell you, Francis."

"Yeah yeah." Francis said. "Continue."

"If we can make it back to the coast and find a harbor with a sailboat that's not damaged and we can get it to work, we can sail it out into the ocean until we find an island to live on, where these bastards can't swim to."

"Wait a minute," Nick interrupted. "So you want us to go all the way back South through Louisiana to the coast to see if we so happen to come across a sailboat?"

"Yep." Coach said.

Nick stared at them in disbelief. "This is fucking ridiculous!"

"Well I personally don't care about your opinion of the situation." Bill said to him.

Nick rolled his eyes.

"It might actually work." Louis said. "An island off in the distance, away from the infected, a place we can call our own."

"I hate islands." Francis said.

"Oh man," Ellis said. "I'm dreamin' of layin' on a sandy beach right now, and it feels gooood..." Ellis said with a smile.

"A good place to relax and feel safe." Rochelle said.

"Well Bill, it looks like the idea's a hit." Louis said.

"Zoey?" Bill asked her.

Zoey was silent for a moment, a smile began to show upon her face.

"It's hard to believe that we'll finally find an end to this hell, but I'd love to find out."

"Amen, girl." Louis said.

"Why a freakin' island?" Francis said. "Isn't there somewhere else we could hang out?"

"You got any better ideas?" Bill asked.

"Yeah, how about we not try to end up with the military?" Nick asked.

"We're not gonna find the damn military out there!" Francis said.

"How can you be so sure?" Nick asked. "When was the last time you knew the exact location of the military? For all we know, we could be at the top of their most wanted list!"

"The old man has a point!" Francis said. "They could be overrun for all I care, we don't even know if they'll find us or not."

"Well then why don't you just shut the fuck up and stop whining like a freakin' baby, huh?" He snapped at Francis.

"Whining?" He exclaimed. "You're the one who won't shut the fuck up! Running your little pretty boy mouth instead of handling it like a man!"

"Look, why don't you just cut the bullshit, okay? Some other time we'll decide who's the bigger asshole, all right? But right now that's me so why don't you just shut up and do what you're supposed to do; be a lazy, mindless biker that beats up wounded zombies."

Francis furiously reached his hand forward and grabbed tightly onto Nick's shirt, raising his fist to give a powerful punch, when Nick raised his pistol up and pressed the barrel to Francis' forehead.

"Guys!" Rochelle shouted in surprise.

"Go ahead," Nick said slyly to Francis. "Throw your punch, I dare you. In an event of trauma the body tenses up; limbs stiffen, fingers clench, right around this trigger here." He smirked. "So go ahead, throw that punch, see what happens. Test your force against physics and see who survives."

"That's enough!" Zoey shouted.

"Listen to the lady," Francis said. "Your fancy talk won't even get you laid if my fist knocks that gun right out of your hand on its way to your butt-ugly face." Francis grunted.

Nick looked up at Francis and reluctantly pulled his gun away from his head and lowered his arm.

Francis released his grasp on Nick's shirt and raised his fist angrily. Without hesitation, he quickly punched Nick straight the eye.

Nick's head was forced sideways as he let out a small angry, yet painful sound. Not a moment later Francis casually walked away and left Nick with a hand over his left eye to cover up the bruise. The group began to slowly walk away, revealing Zoey standing still with her arms crossed, staring at him; upset with his actions.

He lowered his hand to look at her standing before him.

"What the hell are you lookin' at?" He snapped.

Zoey stayed silent.

Nick sighed. "I didn't think he was gonna actually punch me, okay?"

"And you weren't going to actually shoot him?" She asked.

"You kiddin' me?" He asked sarcastically. He held his pistol up and pressed the barrel against his left temple Zoey gasped as she heard Nick pull the trigger, only to have nothing happen.

Zoey sighed with relief and frustration as he lowered the empty gun from his head.

"You actually thought I was gonna shoot him?" He said.

He placed the pistol in the holster on his side and went to join the rest of the group. Zoey followed him close behind.

"I should have known you were full of it." She said as she hurried to catch up to him.

"If I had a nickel for every time you've said that..." He muttered.

"You'd have a nickel." Zoey shot back.

"Don't spend it all in one place." Francis chuckled.

"Let's go, people." Bill said. "We're close to an old evac station in a nearby town. We can rest then and stock up on supplies for the long trip ahead."

"Once we get to that station, we're one step closer to that island." Louis said with a smile. He removed the metal bar on the safe room door and stepped out into the outdoors, the blinding sunlight shining down on the survivors as they continued to head South, taking a different route than their first, hoping to avoid the same problems they encountered along the way.

The houses on the edge of the town were few and far between, contrary to the infected as they ran up to attack the survivors when noticed.

While walking, Louis looked around at the old fashioned homes in the area. Many windows were either boarded up or broken. One home had a dead body stabbed by a shard from a broken window it tried to crawl out of. Blood still slowly dripped from the sharp glass that protruded through the body. He sighed and shook his head as he reflected on the pain and suffering the apocalypse had put the world through. Suddenly he was distracted when he went to step down and accidentally stepped in a wide crack in the pavement beneath him. He stopped and stared as a whole section seemed to have been cracked by a large tremor, as it stretched far across the street. He gently lifted his foot out of the crack and continued to walk with the group.

"It's gonna be hard to do anything with all these damn zombies clawing me." Zoey said as she turned around to shove a zombie's grip off of her sweater.

"These damn things are just being annoying; always popping up in my face." Francis said as he shot a zombie's head off directly in front of him with his shotgun.

"You can just do what I do," Ellis said. "When it gets borin' just blowin' them up you can always let them run around ahead of ya and pretend they're sittin' ducks!"

"Been there, done that." Francis said. "I need something else to do."

"You could always dismember them all with a machete while they're still alive before you chop their heads off." Zoey said. "You know, to make sure they don't come back to life or anything."

Nick, Francis, and Ellis turned and looked at her.

"Well, it is a different approach."

"Jesus, you even scare_ me_ sometimes." Nick said.

"I think your idea is cool..." Ellis said, fascinated.

"I would too, if I bothered to carry a machete." Francis said.

He shot apart another zombie and stepped toward the body when he kicked something that was lying next to the corpse. He walked over to the object and picked it up.

"Hey, a baseball bat!" He said with a smirk. "Now THIS is more like it!"

Suddenly the scurrying sound of a Jockey was heard nearby.

"Hell yeah, a chance to try it out!" Francis said as he put his shotgun away. He held tightly onto his bat as looked around eagerly for the Jockey as its creepy noises grew louder around the survivors.

Bill took a puff of his cigarette and looked around the area in between houses and alleys until he spotted the Jockey running straight for him.

"Jockey!" He shouted as he held his rifle up and began shooting at it.

The Jockey ran up to Bill as he continued to shoot and leapt over him to land right on Ellis' shoulders behind him.

"Get it off!" Ellis shouted. "Why is this thing always on me?" He began to stumble forward toward a street corner in the town. The intersection seemed rather empty compared to the usual amount of infected roaming the streets.

"It ain't right havin' this thing on me!" He shouted as he staggered toward one house on the closest corner. The survivors continued in their pursuit of their friend while firing upon the Jockey as it held tightly onto Ellis' shoulders.

As Ellis continued to fight the Jockey, he finally died and slid right off of Ellis and onto the ground in front of him. From the sudden change in motion, Ellis fell forward onto the ground. He looked in front of him and jumped, crawling backwards away from the body of the Jockey and its ever-grinning face. As he stopped to catch his breath, he heard low, angry growls as their pace escalated, as if anxious. Ellis slowly turned his head behind him to see a Tank staring at him through an open window.

"Oh shit..." He muttered to himself.

The Tank suddenly roared in anger and smashed through the wall between it and Ellis and began to run straight for him.

Ellis stumbled in a panic as he tried to stand up and make a run for it. He grabbed his gun and ran back around the corner toward the survivors.

"TANK!" He shouted as he sprinted toward them.

"Back it up!" Bill shouted as he began to fire on the Tank.

As the survivors opened fire on the Tank, Louis ran up toward Ellis to give him cover fire as he ran toward the back of the group. They continued to fire and run backwards away from the Tank.

The Tank continued to run at them, but was slowing down from the wave of bullets pushing into its skin. It roared angrily and reached down into the street and picked up the section of cracked pavement and hurled it at the survivors.

Bill, Coach, and Louis were luckily out of its path and were not harmed by the fast moving block of pavement.

Zoey saw the block as it hurled toward her and gasped as she froze in a panic. Francis dodged out of its way while Ellis hid for cover behind a nearby tree.

"Get down!" Nick shouted as he quickly grabbed onto Zoey and pulled her with him onto the ground, avoiding the rock as it hit the ground behind them.

Rochelle continued to back away from the Tank until she was stopped by the tree Ellis had hid behind.

She turned to see what she had bumped into, and turned back toward the Tank just in time to see it begin to swing its meaty fist at her.

She fell to the ground as the Tank hit the tree full force. She began to crawl away but the Tank took another swing down toward her, but this time she was not fast enough as the Tank smashed onto her right leg, severely injuring it.

She screamed in agonizing pain and stopped crawling away.

The Tank once again reached its arms up to crush Rochelle beneath it when a small flame from a Molotov whisked past Rochelle and ignited the Tank's meaty flesh.

It screamed in pain and rage as he looked to its left away from Rochelle at Louis and Bill.

"Come on!" Louis beckoned. "You want a fight? We'll give you one!" He shouted angrily.

"Keep firing!" Bill commanded to Louis.

Louis raised his Scar while Bill continued to fire his M-16.

The Tank left Rochelle on the ground and ran right for Bill and Louis.

Rochelle stared at her damaged leg and began to shake. Suddenly Coach stood over her and began to help her up.

"Come on now, it ain't over yet, but you gotta get movin'!"

Rochelle stared at him and nodded. She grabbed onto his hand as he helped her stand up. Francis rushed over toward her and helped hold her steady as she attempted to stand upright while leaning against Francis for support. Zoey ran up to the two of them and picked up Rochelle's SMG. She reached into her pocket and pulled out an adrenaline needle.

"This is gonna hurt, but you'll be okay." Zoey said.

Rochelle just nodded to her and winced in pain as Zoey stuck the needle into Rochelle's other leg and injected adrenaline into Rochelle's bloodstream; to help with the pain and mobility. Coach reach onto his back and began to bandage Rochelle's leg with his first aid.

"It's not gonna heal it right away, but it'll sure hold until we can fix ya." Coach said.

The Tank continued to run for Bill and Louis, but much faster now that it was in pain. Behind the Tank ran up Nick as he fired his AK-47 at its back. Shortly after Ellis ran up and began to fire his auto shotgun into its back as well. The combination of bullets and fire finally led to the Tank's demise, as it sighed and fell forward and landed face first in front of Louis.

Nick cautiously lowered his gun and watched the Tank slump forward in defeat, while Louis held tightly onto his gun and kept it aimed at the Tank as it fell before him. Ellis reloaded his shotgun while Bill reloaded his rifle.

"Not bad, little to no casualties." Bill said.

"That, was close." Louis sighed with relief.

"Too close." Nick said as he and Ellis walked up to them.

"I swear I didn't even see that thing comin'." Ellis said.

"It's all right, kid." Bill said. "You did fine. Better we piss it off early than later on when the entire team's vulnerable." The four began to walk back toward the other group as they circled Rochelle in their best efforts to help her.

"That must have been quite a scare." Louis said as he walked alongside Ellis.

"I actually thought for sure I was a goner!" He exclaimed. "You know how it goes when you're gonna die and you start seein' yer life flash right in front of ya? Well I seen it, from playin' in the woods as a kid to dinners with the family to hangin' out with Keith, like this one time we were tryin' to see if we could fly by tyin' a bunch o' balloons to his grandma's rocking chair while she was sleepin..."

"We get it, Ellis." Nick interrupted.

Bill began to look around the horizon at the silhouettes of tall buildings in the background when he noticed a peculiar sight. Way off in the distance was the steady rise of smoke, but from where was unclear.

The group reunited around Rochelle as she made a painful look down at her injured leg.

"We must be getting closer into the city." Bill said as he continued to stare off into the distance. He then looked at Rochelle and then at her leg.

"How's the leg?" He asked.

"It's...pretty beat up." She said, her voice sounding like she was holding back tears. "I'm not going to be able to put a whole lot of pressure on it."

"She needs some serious help." Coach said.

"Well we're heading further into town, hopefully we'll pass a hospital along the way." Louis said. "With a little luck, you won't be on that leg for too long."

Rochelle smiled. "I really hope not." She said as her smile faded.

"We should get moving." Francis said as he continued to hold her up. "She won't be able to do this all day."

"He's right, and it doesn't look like there will be a whole lot of daylight for much longer either." Louis said.

"All right then, let's go." Nick said.

The survivors then continued toward the middle of town, closer to the evac center and a possible safe room.

With Rochelle in one hand, and his trusty pump shotgun in another, Francis pushed forward as Coach helped support her on the other side. The rest kept the infected as well as the occasional Hunter, Smoker, and Boomer at bay (aside from a few drags, pins, and vomit explosions here and there.)

The buildings around them soon became more modern and closer together. It wasn't long before the survivors reached the center of town. Tall buildings surrounded them as they came upon a sea of abandoned cars.

"Now which way?" Zoey asked as she looked around. "How can we tell where this place is in this mess?"

Bill looked up and saw the smoke cloud once again slowly rising in the sky.

"We follow that smoke cloud." Bill said. "It's out only landmark."

"That's rising pretty high there." Louis said.

"Maybe it's a burning building." Zoey said.

"Don't say that." Nick said.

"Maybe it's a sign." Ellis said.

"Whatever it is will be a good way to tell where we've been." Coach said.

"Then I say we keep going." Bill said.

They continued to make their way deeper and deeper into town toward the smoke cloud when their path was obstructed by a wall of large trucks. One station wagon nearby sat on an angle, its front end stuck atop another car.

Bill stood walked over to the road block and climbed atop the car and surveyed the area. He stared at a very large horde of zombies, flooding the streets of the town. They stood aimlessly scattered along the large wave of cars.

"There's way too many of 'em." He said as he got down. "God dammit! There's too many to take out when we're down a man. One false move and we alert the whole horde."

"What do we do now?" Zoey asked.

"We're gonna have to find a way around them, or we try to take them down."

"Have you lost your mind?" Nick said. "We've been going on for hours, we don't have the resources to take them all out."

"Especially when they're grouped like that." Zoey said. "We're going to have to find something else."

"What about that smoke we've been seein'?" Francis asked. "Is it a fire or what?"

"Yeah..." Zoey said as she turned toward the rising smoke from the scattered abandoned cars.

"Hey, let's go check it out." Ellis said.

Zoey and Ellis found their way around the wall of cars and discovered the source of the fire.

In the distance, the smoke rising was from the engine of a large blue van with an all too familiar picture of the Midnight Riders painted on the side along with their logo spread across the back doors.

"Ohmigod!" Ellis said as he ran toward the van. "Ohmigod ohmigod! It's here! It's actually right HERE!" He shouted in excitement.

"What is?" Zoey asked as she ran to catch up with Ellis.

"This is the Holy Grail of music!" He squealed. "It's THE tour van that the Midnight Riders use to hold their stuff!"

"Their stuff?" Zoey asked curiously.

"Whoa, I can't believe it!" Ellis exclaimed. "Coach, you gotta c'mere and see _this_!" Ellis began to jump and down with a smile almost too large for his face.

"This is the stuff dreams are made of..." Ellis said in awe, his eyes gleaming at the assortment of various sized speakers, guitars, and amps before him.

Zoey began to climb into the back of the van when Ellis put his hand out and grabbed onto her arm.

"Wait!" He said to her. "...I wanna go first. Only a true swearin' die hard blood brother fan should have the permission to enter this sacred place."

"Okay..." Zoey said, trying not to sound freaked out. "Go ahead, it's all yours."

Coach finally caught up to them, and stared with his mouth open; awestruck with what Ellis had discovered.

"Well I'll be damned as shit!" He said, still out of breath from running. "It's the van!" He turned to face Ellis and put his hand on his shoulder. "Well boy, this is it!"

"I almost don't wanna go inside, but... I gotta see their stuff!"

Ellis leapt into the back of the van and began to look over the equipment.

"Aw, man! They got a stereo in here and everythin'!" He said with joy as he looked over the various items packed into the back of the large van.

"I still don't know how we're gonna get in there without pissin' off the whole crowd." Bill said as he surveyed the group of zombies swarming the street.

"Her leg's pretty bad, she'll need at least a couple of days off of it alone." said Louis.

"Well the evac station up there looks like the safest place for a short time."

"Long enough for her to heal at least."

"We're low on ammo, horribly outnumbered, and down a member, this ain't going to be easy." Bill muttered.

Behind them, Francis was still holding Rochelle up as she tried not to put weight on her leg.

"Bill!" Zoey shouted as she ran up to him.

"What is it?" He asked.

"We found a van filled with concert equipment that we could use."

"What are you gonna do, blow their ears off with rock music?" Francis said sarcastically.

"There are a lot of large speakers in there." Zoey said to Bill. "If rigged right..."

Bill smirked as he reached into his pocket and lit another cigarette.

"You know what you're doing, we'll get her to the safe house then come back for you if necessary."

"Thanks." She said with a smile. "We should be able to follow you once we're set up. They won't even see it coming."

She ran back toward the other three that still hung around the van.

"You gonna be okay to move real fast?" Francis asked Rochelle.

"I'll be okay." Rochelle said. "Just don't go too fast."

"Well I'm gonna stick around and help Zoey out here with the zombie problem."

"We can handle it." Bill said. "Tell Coach he's welcome to come with us. I have a feeling he'll find her plan a little young for him."

"We'll take good care of you." Louis said to Rochelle with a smile.

"Thanks." She smiled back.

"Hey, Coach." Francis said as he walked up to the other four. "You think you could help the little lady get to that hotel up there?"

"I'll keep 'em off just fine." Coach nodded. "You gonna take care of the crowd?"

"Yeah, no problem." Francis said. "You get her inside, we'll get ourselves a good mosh pit going." He turned toward the other three. "Right guys?"

"Hell YEAH!" Ellis shouted.

"I'm gonna regret this." Nick mumbled to himself.

"Well I suppose I could always ask Francis to do the heavy lifting instead." Zoey said with a smirk.

"Bullshit!" He snapped.

"That's what I thought." She said.

Inside the van, Zoey and Ellis set up the stereo system to play through the large speakers that were left inside, powered by the van's battery.

"Everyone ready?" Francis asked. He grabbed onto his baseball bat and stood in front of the van.

"Oh! I almost forgot!" Zoey said as she quickly ran toward the front seats of the van and returned with a CD.

"Gotta have something to play first." She said with a smile.

She popped open the stereo disc drive and placed a rock music CD in the tray. She then grabbed her sniper rifle that she had resting against the stereo and knelt down in the van in front of a large speaker, waiting for the horde. Next to her, Ellis was standing while holding an auto-shotgun, anxiously jittering for the moment he had been waiting for. On his other side, Nick was leaning against one of the large speakers against the side of the van with his AK-47 at his side, dreading what was about to happen.

Zoey quickly turned and pressed a button on the stereo. A loud high pitched ringing sound shot out of the large speakers, but fell silent for a second.

Bill heard the sound from the speakers and turned toward Coach, Louis, and Rochelle.

"That's the sign. Let's move!" He said as the four quickly began to weave through the scattered zombies in the street.

Suddenly from the speakers in the van, loud, heavy rock music rang out into the open and it instantly caught the attention of the nearby zombies.

"Are you ready to rock?" Zoey asked the other three.

"Oh, baby, this is awesome!" Ellis shouted.

"Hey Ellis!" Zoey shouted. "I think it's time for that idea we were talking about a while back. You remember?"

Ellis' eyes widened as he squealed with glee and became even more excited.

"Hell yeah I remember!" He shouted. "It's time for Zombie Baseball!"

He knelt down to Francis' height and looked at him.

"Hey, can I borrow yer bat for a second?"

"Sure, knock yourself out!" He said as he handed a bloody bat to Ellis.

"Gimme your gun!" He said to him.

"Yeah, here!" Ellis said as he handed Francis his shotgun. "Fire away!" He said.

"I'll shoot later, I still wanna hit stuff!" He said. "Pass me somethin' to hit with!"

"Here," Nick said as he grabbed one of the guitars in the van and handed it to Francis. "How about smashing a few heads with this?"

Francis grabbed the guitar and whacked an incoming zombie. Its head was sliced apart and sprayed blood all over the edge.

"How's that?" Nick asked as he reloaded his rifle.

"It's a little out of tune." Francis said with a smirk. He continued to attack any zombie that ran too close.

Ellis jumped down from the van and stepped away from the van. As another zombie ran quickly toward him, he aimed his bat and in one swing knocked its head clean off. Blood sprayed everywhere as the body flew onto the ground beneath him.

"Yeah! Home run!" Ellis shouted triumphantly.

Suddenly the number of zombies began to increase. As Ellis and Francis attacked the nearby ones and Zoey and Nick shot the distant ones, they were having trouble keeping up with the large number that continued to swarm.

"What do you think?" Zoey asked as she reloaded her sniper rifle. "Time to run?"

Nick looked at the vast crowd and nodded. "Yeah, I'd say it's time to run, before we end up sitting ducks."

"Okay, time to go guys!" Zoey said to Francis and Ellis.

The two climbed into the van while Zoey and Nick went deeper into the van. Ellis stood behind one large speaker while Francis stood behind the other. When the horde seemed to have their only exit completely surrounded, the two pushed with all their might onto the speakers from the edge of the van. The speakers fell out of the van and onto a group of zombies in front of them, crushing the bodies that were beneath it and slowing down the zombies in front of them. The four then climbed out of the driver's side doors and made a run for the safe room, shooting the nearby zombies while the larger group stayed attracted to the loud music still blaring through the speakers. Soon they were greeted by Bill and Louis who helped give them cover as they all safely made it into the safe room out of breath.

"I have never rocked so hard in my life." Ellis said with a smile. "Oh man, I can't wait to tell Keith about this one!"

"How's your leg?" Nick asked as he looked over at Rochelle, who was laying down on a couch in the corner.

"I think it'll be okay if I lay off of it for a couple days." She said.

"Yeah, she's fine. Don't get your panties in a bunch." Francis said to Nick.

"I don't know how you did it," Louis said. "But you guys put one hell of a wild idea together."

Zoey smiled. "I'm never gonna forget this one."

"Me either!" Ellis said with a smile. "Not in a million years!"


End file.
